C&W creates taskforce for post-COVID-19 recovery

“The virus will dictate when we can eventually return to places of work and commerce, but the time to prepare is now,” said John Forrester, President of Cushman & Wakefield and Executive Chair of the Recovery Readiness Task Force. “We’re mobilizing our top thought leaders and experts, drawing on their experience in areas like workplace innovation and strategy, design and build, facilities management, commercial cleaning protocols, data and technology and research.”

Shortly, the RRTF will be releasing a toolkit with step-by-step protocols for tenants and landlords to use as they begin planning the transition back to the workplace. This effort will build on best practices from Cushman & Wakefield’s experience in China, where the firm is already moving 10,000 companies and nearly a million workers back into more than 1,000 buildings through a joint venture with Vanke Service.

“We’re applying our learnings from Asia so our clients will be well-educated and prepared for the eventual return to the workplace,” Forrester added.

Along with John Forrester acting as the Executive Chair, the RRTF will consist of the following professionals who will be working in coordination with all of the firm’s global subject matter experts:

• Bruce Mosler, Chairman, Global Brokerage, will lead the development of strategic public and private sector partnerships to align operating practices with public policy.
• Despina Katsikakis, Head of Occupier Business Performance, will provide thought leadership on the future of work, while driving workplace strategies from the firm’s Experience Per SFTM tool that contains more than 2.7 million data points on the experience of remote workers pre-COVID-19.
• Edward Law, Head of Operations, Vanke Service Cushman & Wakefield, will provide recovery best practices from China’s largest property and facilities management provider with more than 20,000 employees and 800 MSF under management.
• Paul Bedborough, Chief Executive, C&W Services, will focus on COVID-19 related commercial maintenance and cleaning best practices from the firm’s 14,000-employee, self-performed facilities services business.
• Jeroen Lokerse, Head of Netherlands, will deliver build-out innovation from C&W Design & Build, the firm’s team of leading office architects and designers.
• Adam Stanley, Chief Digital Officer and Chief Information Officer, will focus on data-driven best practices, along with the firm’s broad base of innovation partners for technology and virtual business operations.
• Jason Tolliver, Head of New Commerce Research, will bring a unique perspective of retail and industrial real estate research to provide thought leadership to both landlords and tenants in the rapidly evolving retail and e-commerce sectors.
• Kevin Thorpe, Chief Economist, will continue to produce thought leadership on COVID-19 impacts to the global and U.S. economy, capital markets, finance, leasing fundamentals, property and project management and factors that affect supply-demand.

Six Feet Office

In addition, the RRTF will be focused on developing new products and solutions to help commercial landlords and tenants manage social distancing, including the new design concept “Six Feet Office,” which is currently being tested at Cushman & Wakefield’s Amsterdam office.

The “Six Feet Office” design concept consists of elements that include a visually displayed unique foot traffic routing for each office to ensure employees maintain the recommended six feet apart for social distancing. Additional features include tangible products like clear shields between workstations and a set of simple and workable agreements and rules of conduct that place employee health and safety at the forefront of office culture.