Page 8 - Security Today, November/December 2024

A C C E S S C O N T R O L
The Key to Wellbeing
in the Office
By Matt Welty
‘great resignation.’ Now we have another ‘great’
Afew years ago, all we saw in the news was the
to deal with. According to CBRE, 2023 was the
start of the ‘great return’ as offi ce workers re-
turned to their normal offi ces after working from
home. The data shows that two-thirds of all U.S offi ce buildings
were more than 90% leased as of Q2 2023.
Just as we heard a lot about the great resignation, the great re-
turn is prompting similar talking points as people are once again
confronted with the downsides of offi ce life. The knock-on ef-
fect of these downsides has been a demand for better initiatives
and policies to support employees’ wellbeing. If they must return,
many employees feel they need to be supported.
The forms of support vary from hybrid working to gym mem-
berships or hot desking between offi ce locations. Common to them
all is the need for effortless access control and fl exibility as people
fi nd their way back to shared spaces and open-plan offi ces. In many
instances, the responsibility of making things run smoothly falls on
facilities managers, offi ce managers and installers. To ensure suc-
cess, smart locking solutions are a necessity. As we will see, many
organizations have used them with notable results.
MEETING IN THE MIDDLE
The return to the offi ce has not been welcomed by all. There are
clear dividing lines between employees and management. Gartner
research shows that 48% of offi ce employees believe that return
to offi ce policies prioritize what leaders want over what employ-
ees need. The only solutions that avoid things like quiet quitting
and plummeting wellbeing are ones where employees and leaders
meet in the middle.
Hybrid working, where employees spend several days in the
offi ce and several days at home, is the perfect agreement. It boosts
employee productivity while also allowing in-person collabora-
tion.
To facilitate hybrid work policies and preserve employee well-
being, offi ces need access control solutions suited to the task.
They must be fl exible, integrate smart technologies and be easy
to use.
Faced with this challenge, companies can use ‘hot lockers’ for
their hybrid employees that could be shared by different people
on different days at varying times. Look for locks that allow facil-
ities managers to give all employees unique, card-based access to
each locker, saving the time and money needed to cut thousands
of unique locks for individual lockers. Thanks to the RFID tech-
nology and central control system, facilities managers are also
capable of overseeing employee access for all lockers simultane-
ously and remotely.
As for employees, the process of using the ‘hot lockers’ is fric-
tionless. They simply use their card to access and lock the locker
when they need to store their belongings. When they are not in
Matt Welty is the vice president at Codelocks Inc.
8 N O V E M B E R / D E C E M B E R “Regular exercisers are 129%
more likely to report feeling more
productive at work, and, on top of this,
and 73% of employees who exercise
in the morning say they are more
satisfied at work.”
the offi ce, the locker is available for other employees to use. Some
companies have multiple offi ce locations and the added benefi t of
a system that uses card-based access is that it can be implemented
across several offi ce sites, giving employees the freedom to choose
which offi ce they want to work from without facilities staff or of-
fi ce managers having to coordinate new card access.
WELLBEING BENEFITS BEYOND THE OFFICE
Employee wellbeing goes beyond the four glass walls of the
shared offi ce, which is why we are seeing many organizations of-
fering gym facilities for their staff. An active lifestyle has many
health and work benefi ts that cannot be overestimated. Regular
exercisers are 129% more likely to report feeling more productive
at work, and, on top of this, and 73% of employees who exercise
in the morning say they are more satisfi ed at work. Having exer-
cise facilities at work, therefore, improves employee performance
and makes the offi ce a more desirable location to work.
For offi ce workers, keyless access is a massive bonus. Many
gyms in offi ce buildings require people to bring their own com-
bination locks. When you forget it, they make you buy one at an
infl ated price. As well as being an unnecessary expense, this is
also frustrating. For a workplace gym, this would not help with
morale.
Due to the keyless access, facilities managers have saved a sig-
nifi cant amount of time not having to manage locks. The locks
largely take care of themselves, and the additional capacity has
given them time to focus on other high-priority tasks. The same
goes for gym staff, who, rather than dealing with locks, can focus
on supporting gym users. If something does go wrong, such as an
employee leaving their belongings behind or forgetting their tem-
porary access code, the key override function means the problem
can be swiftly resolved.
From hassle-free access to effortless key override, when it
comes to employee wellbeing, the less friction,
and more fl exibility, the better. As things are
made easier to use, and employees are given
choice in how they use them, employee morale
and productivity is likely to increase.
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