Andrew Carter, Founder of Commercial Eyes Pty Ltd

The notion that knowledge workers will frequent the CBD for the primary purpose of work is past. Working in the CBD of the future will be a choice made by the employee, rather than a direction by the employer. Informing this choice will be the individual’s short-term needs and a range of factors, including social activities, networking opportunities, safety, convenience, cost, environmental impact, and ambience.

The office will develop into primarily a meeting and collaboration space, and will be used intermittently. Importantly it will provide a launching point from which other unrelated activities and endeavours are pursued in the CBD.

Twenty years ago, I started to seriously contemplate establishing and running my own business. It would be a consulting firm, providing commercialisation services to the pharmaceutical, medical device and biotechnology sector.

Possibly the most ambitious part of my plan was that when the business could afford it, it would establish an office in Melbourne’s CBD. An aspirational goal!

I imagined that an office located in the CBD would enable people to travel from greater Melbourne relatively easily, thus encompassing a large employment catchment area. The office would be modern, high-tech, spacious and I along with other employees would travel to work on public transport. Some might ride a bike or walk if they were so inclined.

Employees would augment their workday with all the city of Melbourne had to offer. The plethora of cafés, restaurants and bars; the myriad of shops, galleries, theatres, and the adjacent sporting precinct.

In 2020, my dream is a reality. Commercial Eyes has a Collins Street address, employing 100 people. The office is contemporary, full of light and space. Most baristas would cherish working behind our coffee machine and the bowls of fruit and jar of biscuits just seem to fill themselves.

A CBD address is easy for clients to find and we regularly host local, interstate, and international visitors. The global therapeutics industry knows Melbourne well, and recognises our world class universities, research institutions, teaching hospitals, clinical researchers, leading biomedical companies, industry groups and associated professional services.

Bringing sophisticated biomedical products to the Australian market is a complex task that has multiple steps and requires many actors collaborating. Commercial Eyes is just one.

Due to the COVID19 pandemic, and consistent with government directives, Commercial Eyes staff are working from home, client visits have ceased, face to face interactions are a mere memory, and the office is dormant. Our staff engagement survey tells us that most of our employees are very content to continue to work this way... for some, indefinitely.

Whilst face to face and social interactions are missed and remote meetings are a bit challenging, employees have told us that their preference is to ‘visit’ the office when they need to or it is convenient.

Contemporary technology, systems and databases are doing what they are designed to do. Our staff are mastering them, working productively, and remaining connected – in some cases more than ever.

That said, as the employer, I have genuine concerns about workplace safety – it is nearly impossible to monitor 100 unique spaces and ensure that every home-based workplace is safe all the time.

The conventional benefits of a CBD office location are being challenged. Today, the risk of travelling on densely populated public transport or footpaths, visiting a busy café, or using communal end-of-trip facilities and then squeezing into office lifts is real. Getting to and from the office safely and efficiently is the primary concern of our staff. The fears of the CBD-phobic have been validated. Consequently, the suburbs are wide awake and heaving under the foot traffic of residents, and the city is quiet, reminiscent of a Sunday morning or public holiday.

In years to come, we expect that employees, particularly younger people, will continue to want to experience all that the CBD has to offer. However, in a 180-degree turn from the past, working in the CBD in the future will simply augment all the other features the city has to offer. Employees will come into the city when they choose, and the office will provide a safe and secure base to meet and collaborate.

Consequently, the city must be accessible efficiently, inexpensively, and safely. If people are going to spend time in the CBD, they will want to be able to transition from work activities to leisure activities and back again seamlessly.

Importantly, working remotely and engaging with colleagues, customers and friends via technology is no substitute for spontaneous or planned face to face interactions.

So much of what is intuitive and beneficial when interacting with each other is lost using these technical media. It is similar to watching an AFL game on the TV - the camera focuses on the ball and immediate play around it, and the viewer does not see the broader field of play or the full structure of the game. We get to see the focal point of the action, but not what goes on around it and gives it a deeper meaning.

The incidental conversation and the fresh idea or solution that just ‘comes to mind’ when engaging in a team activity or sharing an experience in the office kitchen; the relationship that blossoms to form the foundation of a deal, partnership or next great business venture need to be fostered. This requires people to ‘be with’ each other.

When I imagined a company with an office based in the CBD, there was a very important business ingredient that I had not considered. It was the experience of walking down one of Melbourne’s famous laneways or streets and running into a colleague, having an impromptu chat or, time permitting, a coffee.

At the heart of most successful businesses are relationships and the generation of ideas. To foster these key ingredients, a Melbourne of the future must continue to establish innovative places, spaces, and opportunities for new relationships to be forged, existing connections to be maintained and lapsed friendships to be renewed.

This opinion paper is part of the City of the Future event 2, exploring focus area 2: Future Business.

Problem statement: How might we encourage new industries and businesses to emerge and thrive in the city?