Flexible working: an entrepreneur’s growth engine

We’re now more con­nect­ed than ever before, not just in terms of com­mu­ni­cat­ing, but also in rela­tion to the dis­tri­b­u­tion of resources. Con­sid­er that two years from now, 80 per cent of the world’s pop­u­la­tion will own a smart­phone. And then there’s the cloud and the rise of 5G: put sim­ply, it’s now eas­i­er than ever to plug in and work from any­where we like.

The rapid advance­ment of new tech­nol­o­gy has paved the way for a grad­ual shift in how we are choos­ing to work. Research from JLL shows that up to 30 per cent of cor­po­rate real estate port­fo­lios could be flex­i­ble work­spaces by 2030 while, accord­ing to CBRE, the flex­i­ble office mar­ket is grow­ing at 13 per cent a year. Flexijobs.com pre­dicts that by 2020, 50 per cent of all work­ers will be remote. With sta­tis­tics like these, it’s clear we are approach­ing a tip­ping point which will trans­form the work­ing expe­ri­ence of mil­lions.

It’s clear we are approach­ing a tip­ping point which will trans­form the work­ing expe­ri­ence of mil­lions

Our appetite for a more agile way of work­ing can also be traced to the desire for per­son­al pro­duc­tiv­i­ty gains achieved from escap­ing the nine to five. Today’s work­force expect more; hav­ing grown up with rapid­ly chang­ing tech­nol­o­gy, their expec­ta­tions are high­er and more open to new ways of work­ing. They know they can set up any­where and work smarter, in a way that suits their lifestyles.

Indeed, a report from the Cen­tre for Eco­nom­ics and Busi­ness Research found that flex­i­ble work­ing could save 533 mil­lion hours a year in com­mut­ing time, sav­ing UK employ­ees an annu­al £3.8 bil­lion, ris­ing to £7.1 bil­lion when the com­muter val­ue of time is tak­en into account. As well as the steep finan­cial costs, why should peo­ple spend sev­er­al hours a day com­mut­ing when they could work from a ful­ly ser­viced office close to home?

For entre­pre­neurs, the flex­i­ble work­ing rev­o­lu­tion will cre­ate com­pet­i­tive advan­tage, save mon­ey, and help attract and retain cus­tomers and tal­ent. Entre­pre­neurs are dri­ven, and they are not like­ly to fol­low a tra­di­tion­al work­ing mod­el as they estab­lish and grow their busi­ness. For them, the abil­i­ty to work any­where, at any time, can be a huge advan­tage, enabling them to remain pro­duc­tive while on the move.

A prop­er­ly net­worked flex­i­ble work­space part­ner can ensure that entre­pre­neurs have access to high-qual­i­ty office space, resources and exper­tise no mat­ter where they are in the coun­try or the world. The same part­ner can help entre­pre­neurs to grow their busi­ness as the avail­abil­i­ty of ser­vice sup­port enables them to focus on val­ue-gen­er­at­ing activ­i­ties rather than spend­ing time and mon­ey on real estate leas­es.

Start­up busi­ness­es can be small and suc­cess­ful busi­ness own­ers keep a very close eye on expen­di­ture. But for many it is also huge­ly impor­tant to project an image about your brand and busi­ness that is going to excite and impress poten­tial part­ners or cus­tomers.

Flex­i­ble work­space providers such as Regus can ensure that not only can you trav­el to where your poten­tial client is, you can be assured when you get there, you can bring them to an office which is mod­ern, friend­ly and impres­sive. Even as a fledg­ling busi­ness, you want to have a base to bring poten­tial cus­tomers, part­ners and employ­ees for meet­ings with­out let­ting down your brand.

Cost-effec­tive, ful­ly equipped spaces can help you punch above your weight for height­ened cred­i­bil­i­ty. With top-of-the-range IT and reli­able wifi, friend­ly and pro­fes­sion­al sup­port staff, as well as high-qual­i­ty cater­ing facil­i­ties, you’ll have all you need to seal a deal and impress clients.

The ben­e­fits of flex­i­ble work­ing run even deep­er than this, though.

One of the most impor­tant advan­tages of a flex­i­ble work­space is the col­lab­o­ra­tive cul­ture that we fos­ter. For entre­pre­neurs, estab­lish­ing a busi­ness net­work can be a huge­ly impor­tant fac­tor in devel­op­ment. Co-work­ing spaces mean you have access to a com­mu­ni­ty of like-mind­ed pro­fes­sion­als from day one. Com­pa­ny through­out the day also helps to pre­vent feel­ings of iso­la­tion and frus­tra­tion that indi­vid­u­als can some­times expe­ri­ence when work­ing alone.

We have seen many of our part­ners begin to work togeth­er, some­times fol­low­ing a sim­ple con­ver­sa­tion over cof­fee as they enjoy the chance to get down to busi­ness in an afford­able and pro­fes­sion­al envi­ron­ment, with none of the pro­duc­tiv­i­ty draw­backs of work­ing from home or a local café. Col­lab­o­ra­tive cul­ture, like-mind­ed peo­ple and poten­tial part­ners; it’s all there with a smart, flex­i­ble
work­space strat­e­gy.

More­over, these ben­e­fits typ­i­cal­ly cost less than rent­ing or buy­ing tra­di­tion­al cor­po­rate real estate, as well as reduc­ing admin­is­tra­tion time for your busi­ness. As an entre­pre­neur, you want to focus on your core busi­ness and reduce the time you spend dis­tract­ed by oth­er activ­i­ties. A flex­i­ble work­space strat­e­gy can help you achieve this.

Regus under­stands entre­pre­neurs and we obsess about meet­ing our cus­tomers’ needs. We have been estab­lished in the UK for almost 30 years and have worked with thou­sands of entre­pre­neurs as they estab­lish and grow their busi­ness. We pro­vide work­spaces, com­mu­ni­ties and ser­vices in almost 3,300 loca­tions in over 1,000 towns and cities across more than 110 coun­tries.

Our clients ben­e­fit from sim­ple con­tracts and report­ing dash­boards, dig­i­tal apps, ded­i­cat­ed account teams, world-class infra­struc­ture and back-office sup­port from a proven glob­al leader. These all help empow­er you and your col­leagues to har­ness the full ben­e­fits of flex­i­ble work­ing.

The work­space rev­o­lu­tion is com­ing and smart entre­pre­neurs are get­ting involved and reap­ing the ben­e­fits. Short com­mutes, bal­anced lifestyles and sky-high pro­duc­tiv­i­ty beck­on. Through flex­i­ble work­ing, you’re set up for suc­cess, wher­ev­er you want to be.

For more infor­ma­tion please vis­it regus.co.uk