A significant proportion of Londoners would prefer to work in a local office space over commuting to the city every day, according to new findings.
Some 43% of 350 professionals based in Greater London want to work in a local workspace either some or all of the time, research from flexible workspace operator Spacemade shows.
On the other hand, only 7% professionals want to work full-time without remote working.
The remaining 93% want to work remotely at least one day a week. Only 15% wish to work remotely full time.
The most popular option was working two to three days a week from a local workspace (61%), while spending the remainder of the week at central offices or at home.
Those aged under 30 led the way in opting for a local workspace, compared with other age groups.
The popularity of local workspaces increased with the size of the businesses that employed the survey’s respondents.
Local working was found to be most popular (nearly 50%) for participants working in medium-sized organisations staffing 50 to 249 people and large firms with 250-1000 staff.
Dan Silverman, co-founder at Spacemade, said: “Lockdown and months of working from home has proved that being in the head office full time is no longer necessary. Likewise, economic uncertainty means organisations are now more sensitive to their real estate costs and will be looking at more flexible ways to manage their office requirements longer-term.
“High-quality office space will be more important than ever before. The central London HQ will have an even bigger part to play as a collaborative, productive space for teams to come together and exchange information and ideas but post-Covid there will need to be a stronger purpose for people to commute each day.”
Jonny Rosenblatt, co-founder at Spacemade, said: “The momentum for flexible working has been growing steadily over the past decade. Employers have embraced a rise in condensed hours and staggered hours and occasional working from home.
“Coronavirus is accelerating this change in an unprecedented way and signals a significant shift in the future role of the core office and flexible working patterns.”
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