Officewashing isn’t really a term yet, but I hope it becomes one. I first heard the term the other day in a comment from Ana Lucas so if you are planning to trademark it, time may be short 😊 If you are wondering about the boring office picture associated with this article, I asked Midjourney to create the most beautiful office imaginable with all possible amenities. This is what it came up with. I guess even AI can’t come up with a way to make the current office more appealing.
What is Officewashing?
Since I don’t think Officewashing has an official definition, I’d like to propose one:
Officewashing is when an organization spends more time and money on promoting the value of their existing office than adapting to changes that have occurred in the way we work. It’s an approach used by companies to exaggerate the importance of the current office structure to appease those with the most to lose in the Commercial Real Estate market.
Officewashing is a form of corporate propaganda that misleads consumers and investors into thinking that remote work is damaging to the economy and that people returning to offices will improve company productivity and fix the current commercial real estate crisis. Officewashing can involve:
- Misleading language
- Incomplete or inaccurate information
- Outright lies
Follow the Money
When Henry Ford started producing cars there was no uprising by horse brokers highlighting the damage to the economy by not keeping horses around. The people who cleaned up after the horses didn’t protest to get their jobs back either. All things considered, there was a pretty fluid transition. In the case of offices, you have large investments in a physical asset that isn’t going away even though demand has plummeted. A lot of wealthy people have a lot to lose. It’s not just the building owners, it’s owners of commercial real estate securities that have flooded into markets. You would have thought that the securitization of mortgages during the subprime market collapse would have been a warning sign.
Instead, the same players changed mortgage types and created a whole new type of securities that was fine until demand for commercial real estate changed.
Major banks and investment firms are spreading the news that all we need is for people to come back to the office. “The pandemic is over, it’s time to come back. You’re missing out on collaboration”. It reminds me a little of the scene in Animal House where Kevin Bacon is screaming, “All is well, remain calm”. Investors are extolling the virtues of offices, not to benefit the companies that occupy them, but to protect their investments.
What’s Really True
We are surrounded by “truths” that aren’t true. The Great Wall of China can’t be seen from outer space. But it can from low earth orbit. Einstein didn’t fail at math in his early years. They changed the grading system. And humans don’t just have five senses. We can also sense our location and presence relative to our surroundings and temperature variations, among other things.
Offices are needed for collaboration is another one of these “truths”. Being in the same physical location as other people improves collaboration, but why does this have to happen in an office? The reality is that an office is just one of many places we will collaborate now and in the future. I sense that traditional offices are relatively low on their collaborative values compared to coworking spaces, retreats, and other locations.
What’s also true is that some people will hold onto old ways even when there is evidence that things are moving in a different direction. Investors should be looking at new uses for “office space”. And CEOs who are trying to get people back to the office need to realize that the way we work has changed. No amount of officewashing is going to change either of those things. It might fool some people for a little while, but much like greenwashing, eventually, people start to see through it.
