If there’s one thing we learned from the pandemic, it’s that the workplace will never be the same. Large and small companies discovered a lot of their work could be done from home, and in many cases, people got more work done there.
Business owners also realized they could save a ton of money by NOT leasing huge office buildings. So where will all of this shake out? Where will work take place in the future?
Marlaine McCauley-Watson and Matt Watson have been helping companies plan, build, and maintain their workspaces for decades. Marlaine started Apex Facility Resources in 1997. Matt brought his experience to the company after moving pianos as a football player in college and spending decades in the office logistics space.
Host Mark Wright sat down with Marlaine and Matt to learn more about what post-COVID workspaces look like, what trends are on the way, and what business owners and employees need to know about these changes.
Since Marlaine and Matt built the company from the ground up, they also offer a wide range of advice on other things like hiring, growing a business, and staying super flexible in today’s ever-changing economy.
Whether you work in your jammies or a suit, in a high-rise or your home office, we know you’ll appreciate Marlaine and Matt’s wisdom about the future of the American workspace.
Resources from the episode:
- Connect on LinkedIn with Matt and Marlaine. You can also find Matt on Instagram (@nwsteel).
- Learn more about Apex Facility Resources on their website and connect with them on LinkedIn.
- Apex Facility Resources is social! Find them on Facebook (@ApexFacility), Twitter/X (@ApexFacility), and Instagram (@apexfacility).
Share Article on Social Media
Transcript
The following transcript is not certified. Although the transcription is largely accurate, in some cases it is incomplete or inaccurate due to inaudible passages or transcription errors. The information contained within this document is for general information purposes only.
Speakers: Matt Watson, Marlaine McCauley-Watson, and Mark Wright
MATT WATSON 00:00
I watch a, you know, report that is provided by user uh, access badges throughout the country and they put 10 cities up and it’s still only 49. 5% occupancy throughout the country. In Seattle and San Francisco and San Jose, it’s far lower than that and I would say that occupancy would be 49% Tuesday through Thursday, Mondays and Fridays would probably be lucky to hit 30. So, there is a huge tailwind to this. That will probably change work life as we know it.
MARK WRIGHT 00:45
This is the BEATS WORKING show. We’re on a mission to redeem work – the word, the place, and the way I’m your host, Mark Wright. Join us at winning the game of work. Welcome to BEATS WORKING, winning the game of work. On the show this week, the future of where we work. If there’s one thing we learned from the pandemic, it’s that the workplace will never be the same. Tons of companies discovered a lot of their work could be done from home, and in many cases people actually got more work done there. But business owners also realized they could save a ton of money by not leasing huge office buildings. So where will all this shake out? Marlaine McCauley-Watson and Matt Watson have helped companies for decades plan, build and maintain their workspaces. Marlaine started the company Apex Facility Resources in 1997. Matt started moving pianos as a football player in college and has decades of experience in the office logistic space. I wanted to learn from them what post COVID workspaces look like right now, what trends are on the way, and also what business owners and employees need to know about all these changes. Oh, and since they built the company from the ground up, there are a ton of key takeaways on things like hiring, who to hire, who not to hire. Here’s a hint, don’t hire everyone who’s just like you also growing the business. And I found this super interesting, staying flexible in today’s ever-changing economy, how to scale up super-fast if you get a big project, well, whether you work in your jammies or a full on business suit, I know you’ll appreciate Marlaine and Matt’s wisdom about work and where we do it, Marlaine and Matt Watson from Apex Facility Resources. It’s great having you both on the beats working podcast. Good to have you here.
MATT WATSON 02:41
Thanks for having us.
MARK WRIGHT 02:43
You bet. So, Apex is a company that specializes in workspace services. And one of the cool things that I love discovering about people is that unless you own or manage a business, you have no idea that companies like yours even exist. Um, I went golfing the other day with a whole group of people who were in the concrete industry. And it’s like, you just have no concept of, of the businesses that keep our economy running. And, uh, that’s one of the reasons that I’m excited to talk with both of you. So, to get things going, Marlaine, I’d love for you to start by explaining to our audience what Apex is and what Apex does.
MARLAINE MCCAULEY-WATSON 03:20
So, uh, Apex is a, uh, company that helps, uh, commercial clients or customers, uh, that have a workspace need or event. So, whether it’s planning for new furnishings, uh, relocating their office, uh, including space planning, et cetera. So really start to finish. And then ongoing services beyond the project that they may need on an ongoing basis after their projects complete. That’s the simplified version.
MARK WRIGHT 03:51
Well, that’s good because I need simple answers so that I can understand it. So, are we talking about sort of soup to nuts, everything that you would find in an office building?
MARLAINE MCCAULEY-WATSON 04:01
Yes.
MARK WRIGHT 04:03
Okay. Um so when as I was thinking about uh talking about with you today. Um, how come, uh, businesses don’t do what you guys do themselves? Why did they go out of house to fix these sorts of, uh, problems? Matt, do you want to take that?
MATT WATSON 04:20
Well, sure. There’s, uh, for most of the projects we service, uh, and, and are supportive of, there are multiple categories of vendors they have to deal with. And, you know, for an office relocation, for instance, from the broker, the architect, the space planning interiors, the furniture, the office relocation on the data and technology side, they have data infrastructure, they have to install themselves and they’re oftentimes overwhelmed by all of those varieties of skill sets and vendor client or vendor requirements that, you know, just they don’t have practice working with. And we find with leases every five to 10 years, the people who actually gear up and do this work with us, meaning our contacts at those companies, they’re either gone by the time their, their project is over, or they don’t remember what they had to do to get through this, you know, kind of epic journey. It’s really a journey. And Marlaine, like Marlaine said, what’s really interesting, what we realized back in the late 90s when the business was started was that when the furniture gets delivered and they move in, that, that isn’t the end. Um, there is never an end to facilities, uh, services that are required to manage growth, change, evolution. So, we really have designed a business that’s built to manage and support change. And now more than ever, that has become like the priority that almost all of our competitors are trying to catch up to us on and try to figure out how to provide.
MARK WRIGHT 05:59
Yeah, I guess it makes sense. You know, when we build houses or remodel our homes, we generally hire a general contractor because we don’t know how to find the best plumber or electrician, or you know floor person. And so that, that, that makes a lot of sense. Marlaine, I’d love to know more about your background and how you, you started the company, right? Are you the founder?
MARLAINE MCCAULEY-WATSON 06:19
Yes. Um, so, um, for a number of years I had been in the legal business, legal industry, um, as a construction paralegal and so, was very familiar with construction terminology, et cetera, uh, um, because of that experience. But also, um, getting a case ready for trial is very similar to just project management in general and, um, learning how to bring resources together to be able to accomplish that. And I found that really that’s, um, kind of my superpower is bringing a lot of things together to make, you know, to have a successful project. And so, um, when the opportunity came to make a career change and start this business, um, I, I’m still amazed at how often I still use a lot of those skills around construction management, construction, reading blueprints, understanding the flow of a project, and when different subcontractors are required to come into that project. So that, um, I can understand what needs to happen when and help a client navigate that as well. So, um, so yeah, I, I was in the legal industry and then, uh, opportunity came knocking and here I am.
MATT WATSON 07:37
Well, and I think there were other skill sets that she doesn’t mention that I’ll, I’ll bring to bear as well. She’s an amazing listener. Um, I think most if not all our clients feel very heard whenever she’s in the room. I always joke that she is our best salesperson who doesn’t like to sell simply because she is a consultive, uh, in her approach and takes the perspective of how she would view it in their shoes. So, I think that’s a huge, uh, opportunity for her and for us and that’s helped our growth.
MARK WRIGHT 08:08
Yeah, the tone that I’m getting from you both is sort of the opposite of a used car salesperson. I can’t imagine Marlaine saying, what’s it going to take to get you into this furniture? It’s like, it’s more like, what can I do to help you?
MATT WATSON 08:24
Yeah. Let’s, let’s solve, let’s solve the problem, the right problems. I think a lot of times people, um, see so many different, uh, opportunities or ideas that it becomes very complicated. So. I think a big motivation of our company is to simplify the complex and that workspaces have become and are still becoming, uh, complex.
MARK WRIGHT 08:45
Yeah. Marlaine, so you’ve been at it for about 20 years. Is that right?
MARLAINE MCCAULEY-WATSON 08:49
Uh, 26. Yeah. February was 26 years.
MARK WRIGHT 08:55
So, what was the industry like back then? And what was it like being a female going into, was, was the industry dominated by mostly men back in those days? And what was that like?
MARLAINE MCCAULEY-WATSON 09:03
Um. You know, it’s interesting. I get asked that question sometimes. I, um, I think where I experienced that was maybe more on the customer side where they were accustomed to working with, you know, a male salesperson or whatnot, but I never felt that that, uh, held me back. I think competency. Despite one’s gender, if you’re competent, uh, I just never felt that that was a barrier for me, uh, being a woman owned business or, you know, a woman and, and it was a lot of, um, men were dominating on the ownership side primarily, but that that’s changed quite a bit. And like I said, I think, uh, being competent and, um, you know, knowing your stuff, so to speak, uh, I never felt that it was a barrier.
MARK WRIGHT 09:57
Yeah. What was it like in those early days? Was it, was a touch and go or did you have success pretty much from the get go? Matt’s laughing.
MATT WATSON 10:07
Hurry up, collect the bills. We gotta pay, we gotta, we gotta make payroll.
MARLAINE MCCAULEY-WATSON 10:10
I wore many, many hats, uh, and was having babies at the same time. So, um, I was eight months pregnant when I started the business. That’s how I can remember how old the business is, because I say, okay, our child is 26. Um, and, uh, I did everything. I had, it was a crash course in, uh, space planning, so I had to teach myself a space planning software. Um, I had to get QuickBooks and become proficient at accounting pretty quickly. Uh, and, and then learning all the various parts and pieces that go into furniture back then, at least. Um, yeah, it was a crash course, but I loved it. I loved it. It was just me for the first five years.
MATT WATSON 10:59
And it doesn’t hurt to have a photographic and autographic memory.
MARLAINE MCCAULEY-WATSON 11:04
Well, that photograph is a lot fuzzier now.
MATT WATSON 11:08
She can remember virtually anything she looks at. The hard part about this industry are the complications around specification of furniture. Um, I remember being at an event, you know, a conference 20 years ago, and the speaker was talking about among the top three furniture providers, Steelcase, Herman Miller and Hayworth. There were four quadrillion options. That was 20 years ago. Well, yeah, quadrillion. So, yeah, it can be very complicated.
MARLAINE MCCAULEY-WATSON 11:38
Well, to make it more challenging, what? The installers in the field call things is not what the manufacturer calls things. And so there is that learning curve as well, where I said, what’s a pork chop? I don’t know what that is. And then it was just called something, it’s a bracket, you know, that’s shaped like a pork chop. And, uh, so there was those, you know that,
MATT WATSON 12:00
From the field, there’s a different language for the furniture than what’s specified in the actual, the language of the manufacturer used.
MARLAINE MCCAULEY-WATSON 12:07
But it was absolutely the best way to, uh, learn quickly and, um, I would go out on the installs and be on site and ask questions of the installers. What’s that? You know, how does that go together? Et cetera. So that I could explain it better to a client. So, um, but yeah, that was, I, you know, I, I kind of think now I’ve been away from the actual specification process of the, so things have changed so much now that, uh, I would feel a little lost if I were trying to, ha, ha, trying to navigate that right now. Fortunately, we have good people. Ha, ha, ha.
MARK WRIGHT 12:43
That’s awesome. I, uh, you know, I spent 35 years in TV news, and it was always a big deal when we got new anchor chairs on the, on the news set. But almost inevitably, every time we got new chairs, they didn’t fit, or they didn’t function the way that and they almost never asked us like, hey, come on in when we’re going to be selecting the chairs, we would get chairs and it’d be like, uh, well, um, the desk is about at my Adam’s Apple and this, so this is not going to work. We’re going to have to use huge pads and it was, it just, so I’m just laughing because at a very like simple level of ordering four chairs for a business, how hard that was to get right. And I’m just imagining an office tower, like for an Amazon or a Microsoft, just how complicated that whole process must be. Do you have any, do you have any stories, Marlaine of, of like one of the biggest challenges of your career?
MARLAINE MCCAULEY-WATSON 13:40
Um, I think it’s when, uh, we started growing rapidly, uh, Matt joined the business in 04, 2004 and brought with him a lot of his relationships and clients. And, um, you know, I had to learn a lot about just running a business, um, by trial and error. And in some ways, there were more errors, you know, then I’d like to admit it’s, it’s, you know, buying the wrong software to discover the right software I actually needed to get. Um, and so I felt that was our biggest challenge was, um, on the one hand, we were growing very quickly, needed to hire a lot of people. Um, we didn’t have a lot of the systems and processes in place that were needed. So, we’re kind of repairing the airplane in flight, so to speak. And uh, that was, that was pretty stressful. Those were pretty stressful times. And um, so, you know, we can laugh about it now, but when you’re in the middle of it, you’re just put your head down and what can you do just, you know, take one step, put one step in front of the other.
MATT WATSON 14:48
Yeah. In the middle of the tech boom, we were number four on the fastest growing 100. So as a non tech company, which we were serving all of those guys. And, you know, we were dialed in with some of the largest and fastest growing companies in the world at that time. And still are the fastest growing in our lifetimes. We will probably never see the growth that we’ve seen in our career.
MARK WRIGHT 15:11
Yeah. Matt, you started your career in the relocation industry in the early 1980s. I didn’t realize this until I read some of the info that you sent over. You were a football player at the University of Idaho. Go Vandals! It was just across the border at Wazoo. And you were a mover and truck driver, uh, during college, I guess. So, is that your sort of summer job? Um, what was that like? I mean, when you graduated, you, you went into sales in the relocation industry. But I guess, so you, you really got to know that industry from the ground up. If you were hauling, hauling stuff and moving it.
MATT WATSON 15:45
Some of the greatest experience of my life was probably on the crew. And eventually running those crews and overcoming the obstacles that the crews have in the field that sales and admin never hear about and, um, you don’t complain. You just do. And I, I was mentored by salty vets who would, uh kick me around the corner a couple of times as I was the college boy on those trucks, and I didn’t know nothing as they used to remind me and make me well aware of, but the beauty is I earned respect by doing and learning and I’m very coachable kid. So, to speak no pun intended and learned a ton about the business by doing so many different things and I mean uh, household relocations, commercial office relocations, international relocations, uh, packing, unpacking, delivering, installing, all those things. Very, very helpful.
MARK WRIGHT 16:43
What a great education. I’m guessing you learned some creative swear phrases, too, from those guys.
MATT WATSON 16:50
Uh, I still have terminology today that I’m not allowed to use because, you know, kids these days can’t hear that sort of thing.
MARLAINE MCCAULEY-WATSON 16:58
It would not be politically correct in many ways.
MATT WATSON 17:01
No, uh, you know, when I said, hey, I want Saturday off, I’ve got to do this, I was reminded that they replaced Kennedy in five minutes. And that was my operations manager. Yeah. So it was, there were no options.
MARK WRIGHT 17:18
But I’m guessing, you know, as a football player, and if I had a moving company, I’m looking at this football guy, I’m thinking, this is a, this is a good hire, right? You probably could lift quite a bit.
MATT WATSON 17:27
Well, the moving company that I started with, and I still love to this day, is Hanson Brothers Moving and Storage. And they’re well over a hundred-year organization, still run by a, by the great, great grandson of the original founder. And he’s a mentor of mine. And one of the things they had me doing was pushing pianos upstairs. Uh, they did a ton of piano moving. I mean, we were moving grands, uprights, and
MARK WRIGHT 17:50
How much does a grand piano weigh?
MATT WATSON 17:51
About 900 pounds.
MARK WRIGHT 17:53
Oh my gosh. That’s enough to blow out your bag.
MATT WATSON 17:56
And the ones that really hurt you were the uprights. The big uprights were really difficult, because they stood so tall, and we put them on a piano board, and we had to shove them up the stairs, and you know over in, you know, different parts of Seattle, you know, there are some stair flights and we had interior inside the homes. We had to negotiate stairs and put things on different levels, and it was me basically on the bottom of that. So,
MARK WRIGHT 18:20
Oh my gosh that you know, you can ruin a lot of stuff I we just had our house kind of remodeled and we got a new fridge, and the fridge guys came, and they put it halfway into the space and they said to my wife, Ma’am it’s too tall. Uh, so they left it there and they said, uh, could you sign the paperwork, and you could probably sand it down a little bit and I’m thinking, that’s not just sanding. So, I had to get my circular saw out. I put a piece of cardboard down and I pushed this massive fridge out of the way thinking that the cardboard would be enough to protect our brand-new hardwood floors that they just did.
MATT WATSON 18:54
You got a little floor repair job? That’s cause you know.
MARK WRIGHT 18:56
Oh. So, yeah, I had to call the floor guy back and he just looked at it. It just shook his head.
MATT WATSON 19:01
Yeah, we did, we did many moves where we would have, you know, a 75 year or 80-year-old woman watching us move the piano up and down stairs or out of a home and, and they had remodeled around the piano. And we, we were telling her, hey, this didn’t get moved in this way. Oh yeah. That we did remodel back in 67. You know that sort of thing.
MARK WRIGHT 19:24
So, Marlene, um, I read that Apex plans, manages and furnishes workspaces in what’s called an integrated service way. I’d love to know what integrated service means as it relates to what you guys do.
MARLAINE MCCAULEY-WATSON 19:39
So, Matt touched on it a little bit, um, where we’ve combined a lot of the, um, services that are needed for a project, you know, any kind of a workspace project. Um, We’ve integrated those internally so they, we really can handle about five different things that, um, a project requires that they may otherwise have to go use five other vendors for, um, and so, uh, you know, when, when I was coming up with a business name, resources in the name made sense because I wanted to be a resource to our customers, whether we were able to help them or not. And so, it just has, um, worked out that with Matt’s expertise in commercial relocation, warehousing and storage, et cetera, complex logistics, um, uh, we’ve been able to integrate successfully a lot of those different things, including the furnishing part. Uh, where, you know, many competitors either they’re calling a moving company who doesn’t sell furniture or a furniture company, furniture dealership that doesn’t necessarily do relocation or that does, you know, uh, disposition of spaces as we’re doing a lot of that right now where companies are moving out, um, and or downsizing. So, we call that a disposition. Um, we, we can do all of those things very at an expert level.
MARK WRIGHT 21:03
Yeah, because sometimes you have to store furniture long term, right? For, for a client. Yeah. I’m really looking forward to talking with you both about just this massive seismic shift that we’ve seen in the American workspace because of the pandemic, I guess, precipitated. But before we get there, I really would love to find out from both of you. When you’re looking at growing the business and hiring people, I’d love to get some wisdom and insight from how you did that. Because I think. Whenever I’ve been asked to sit in on job interviews to try to evaluate someone, I just, I just feel lost. I feel like, man, everybody can put on a good face and, and it’s hard to find a paper trail when people, you know, maybe not, are not the, the best, uh, employees. So, what, what’s your best advice, Marlaine, when you’re growing a company, how, you know, how do you hire good people?
MARLAINE MCCAULEY-WATSON 21:53
Well, um, it’s one of those things that I had to learn. Um, you know, we thought if they had industry experience and, you know, we’re looking for a job that they’d be a great fit for Apex. And over time, at one time we had 80 employees and, um, as you know, markets change and we’ve gone through a few recessions or, you know, challenging times in, in, in our, uh, work history. Um, I would get very frustrated how we would hire this, you know, star person who then ended up being very toxic to our organization and, um, and so, you know, really look to EO a lot for, you know, there’s got to be a better way. And I came across, um, uh, through contacts, got referred to, have you heard of Top Grading? Uh, by Brad Smart, uh, or, uh, he started it with, um, GE and then his son, uh, Greg, I think, um, has kind of taken it and morphed it, but it’s, it’s about a hiring process designed to help you, uh, increase your odds of hiring the right person. It’s not just the resume. It’s not just, you know, the one or two interviews, there’s specific questions to ask that teases out more of that, um, history that you aren’t going to see on a resume. Um, and so we started implementing some of those things, like, you know, what are, what do you like to do and what don’t you like to do. Um, when I talk to your, who’s your, you know, close colleague or friend, and they give you a name. Well, when I talk to Bob, what do you think he’ll say? And when they, when they are seeing it through Bob’s lens, they tell you stuff they wouldn’t tell you otherwise, which is really kind of interesting. But, um, I am a stickler for hiring, increasing our chance of hiring the right person. I also had to understand what made people successful at Apex. Like, what is our secret sauce? And the people that have, uh, helped the company grow, who love being there, have been an integral part to the culture and how it got developed. Um, I kind of interviewed them, talked to them about why they liked working there and um, and we discovered there’s four traits that makes an employee successful at Apex. And, um, it starts with being a, uh, natural problem solver. If you have to be told what to do or how to do your job all the time, probably not going to be, you know, a great fit. Um, uh, a continuous learner. Our industry never change, uh, never stops changing. And so, uh, we’ll, we’ll never know everything there is to know, and I want those curious people, um, uh, because they’ll, they’ll just explore on their own to try to find an answer, or, um, even in, in promoting people from within, it’s, uh, they’re, they ask questions about, you know, what does my career path look like here, and how can I, I’m really interested in, interested in accounting, for example. And then we also use, uh, a testing tool, that helps us identify the, the job, uh, the position requires high levels of certain characteristics that is really a DNA thing. It’s not something, you can teach skill, but there’s some things you can’t teach. And so, uh, we, we test looking for, do they have enough of that DNA that we know will make them successful in this position? Um, if they were hired for another position, they may not be successful in that position. But for this one. Um, they have to meet a certain criteria, um, and we’ve gone to, we’re now at 38 employees because I was, um, determined to utilize technology to be more efficient and make sure we have the right people in the right seats. So, by doing that, we’ve been able to really operate as a lean company, but the comments we hear most from our employees is how, what a great place it is to work. And that was really ultimately what I wanted because when I was an employee, I wanted a great place to work. So, um, just started with people who are smart, want to work with other smart people.
MATT WATSON 26:20
Yeah, I think the other thing that we learned a lot from our mistakes, and we always reviewed why the termination or exit, why it happened. And the thing we learned a lot about was we like to hire people like us. Which aren’t that those personality traits, you know, I’m, I got a big personality, you know, type a personality, and maybe we needed somebody with a heads down focused personality for a position rather than somebody who I like, you know, and I would never, you know, those things, we had so many, uh, one dimensional personality profiles at the company at one point it was like, oh, oh,
MARLAINE MCCAULEY-WATSON 26:59
We’re hiring a lot of ourselves.
MATT WATSON 27:01
We’re hiring ourselves. Not good.
MARK WRIGHT 27:06
Wow, that’s, that’s really cool and refreshing that you can that you can admit that and that you learn from that. Okay, let’s talk about the elephant in the room. I have a number of friends who are in the commercial real estate space and wow, it’s been a roller coaster since the pandemic started. Seismic shift in what the American workplace looks like. I’m curious, the pandemic forced a lot of companies and workers to go remote, move out of some really expensive office space, or at least to vacate it for a while. What did the pandemic do to your company’s business? I’d like to start there and then let’s talk more about the workplace.
MARLAINE MCCAULEY-WATSON 27:42
Um, well, we support a few health care clients in the area. And, um, so we were an essential business. I mean, every, what we did initially internally was anyone who could work from home. We had work from home and we’re in the furniture business. So, we were able to get them set up and, and, uh, um, and, uh, so we were an essential business because we were supporting healthcare, you know, hospitals. And so, we were still busy and in, in some ways we were even busier because there weren’t a lot of companies like ours who could be that essential business. So, um, it, it was every day was something different. We had our own internal challenges, uh, with employees. One, uh, was diagnosed with cancer, uh, right after the pandemic that needed a lot of support with his family. And, um, while we’re navigating, you know, the vaccinations, et cetera, do we mandate that? So, so we were helping clients, you know, try to figure out what they were doing. Um, and, uh, helping consult them, but internally we were also experiencing a lot of the same, uh, you know, challenges that a lot of our clients were experiencing. So, um, um, you know, we survived and thrived actually, and in 2020 I think was our biggest year ever.
MATT WATSON 29:12
Biggest year in history.
MARLAINE MCCAULEY-WATSON 29:15
But it required all our people to be able to pivot very fast, and you know, the faucet got turned on and all of a sudden, it’s, you know, we just wanted to make sure our clients were taken care of. So, some people were working long hours. Um, we also had to be very flexible knowing people’s children were now at home. Um, you know, many a Zoom call were, you know, so and so is running behind. Their, their children are running behind them. And it just, we just were as flexible as we could be and, uh, and understanding. But people were working after they put kids to bed because during the day it was really challenging to get that done. Um, and I think it actually helped us bond more as a company, uh, with each other because we’d been through something together. But, uh, yeah, I mean, I can speak a lot more to what was happening in the market itself, but, um, it, it, it was a scary couple of years for sure.
MARK WRIGHT 30:16
Yeah, I think it was even like maybe two years into the pandemic and still like not even half of employees had returned to downtown Seattle. It was such a shocking transformation. Matt, what happened from your perspective when, when that mass exodus happened, you know, was that, was that a trend that was already underway before the pandemic?
MATT WATSON 30:36
Yes. Um, a very slow progressive trend, but a trend all the same. Uh, they said every 10 years there was a 5% or an 8% increase in remote work. And all of a sudden that turned into a hundred percent. So, it expedited technology. It expedited mindset. It expedited everybody. It just shock and awe the whole industry. Um, you know, we have key accounts who, some of which flourished because internet, you know, their internet retail. Was our largest account and they were exploding because of the amount of online retail they were doing. And so, we rode that, that wave with them and help them throughout the country. We, we don’t just provide services in our greater Puget Sound area. We provide all throughout the country throughout North America, as a matter of fact, including Canada are non-account relationships are non-account business, which is just the smaller organizations, small companies want to move at or change within their facilities that all froze. And so, your commercial real estate transactional activity. We’ve that, that’s our small custom, you know, the mid market customers, what we call them, they went away. And actually, I was more freaked out in 08 or 09 than I have, than I was because of the way we were writing with our accounts, but many, as Dan knows, many key industries evaporated. And so, we have been in a recessionary half of our business or over half of our business has been in a recessionary fix for almost three years now. And we don’t see it coming out for another couple. And we don’t know if that’s even going to look right today. I watch a, you know, report that is provided by user access badges throughout the country and they put 10 cities up and it’s still only 49.5% occupancy throughout the country in Seattle and San Francisco and San Jose. It’s far lower than that, and I would say that occupancy would be 49% Tuesday through Thursday, Mondays and Fridays would probably be lucky to hit 30. So, there is a huge tailwind to this that will probably change work life as we know it.
MARLAINE MCCAULEY-WATSON 33:08
I was going to say to add on to that, the changes we’ve seen in terms of the requests we’re getting, more collaborative space, more lounge and social areas, uh, companies trying to figure out how do we attract people to want to come back rather than having to try to force them to come back. So, it’s, you know, making it enticing. Some people, the one thing that, uh, we’ve learned is, I get energy working from home. I do not get energy going into the office. But there are many, uh, of our employees who really enjoy being around each other and want to go in. Great, do it. I would not be productive, uh, if I went into the office. And so, understanding everyone’s best work style, um, giving them opportunities to come back. But those are more of the requests we’re seeing now is refreshing in a way, refreshing their spaces in a way that will attract those employees to want to come back at least a few times a week.
MARK WRIGHT 34:04
Yeah, and it just reminds me, you know, back in the, in the tech boom days, you know, the enlightened workspace was having a ping pong table and maybe beer on tap. But, uh, uh, that never happened in TV stations, but I had friends in the tech industry. I’m like, man, you guys get to play ping pong on your lunch break. That’s no fair. But it just, uh, you know, when it seems like, um, that whole idea of building culture, um, I’d love to know, maybe from you, Matt. How important is a physical workspace when it comes to building company culture, training employees, fostering that collaboration and creativity? I mean, that physical proximity is something that has a tangible value that I don’t think we’ve quite figured out yet, have we?
MATT WATSON 34:49
Well, I think that’s one of the biggest holes in the game right now for, remote work is how do the young entering our industries get mentored and developed. I learned by sitting next to an operations manager or another sales guy on the phone overcoming obstacles with clients and or vendor partners and my role, you know, learning in this industry was by doing and the hard part is many of the young people are not given the chance to learn by doing or even having a casual drive by, by a seasoned vet who can, you know, shorten their you know, learning, you know, learning requirement by helping them with key points that they may not be, they may not learn on their own. So, one is mentoring and developing huge problem. I don’t see that. That’s a necessity for a workspace culture. There’s always a there’s always been a lot of different philosophies around how space is designed for culture. I think what’s interesting is, you know, many of my startup, you know, you know, people in E.O. Entrepreneurial Organization, who had startups, you know, folding tables and, you know, cheap chairs and furniture meant nothing. It was about just camaraderie and overcoming and getting to the next level and, you know, getting to that next raise that fundraise. So, depending on your work and who you’re working with. Uh, culture means something different I think, um, create it. We serve a lot of the tech community. In fact, 70% of the downtown Seattle and Bellevue markets is creative in tech. So, and it’s frozen. I mean, occupant vacancies are closing in on 25 mid-twenties in both markets, although they won’t tell you that if they put the sub, um, the leased space that they’re subletting as well as the vacant space, which is going to become more vacant as people renew their leases in the next two years, there will be a serious reckoning going on here. And the interesting part is reconsidering and reinventing is, I think we’re in mid flow of that and there’s a, a lot of different, uh, as I like to say, the more things change, the more they say the same. There are certain fundamentals in a workspace development and design that supports teaming and learning. There are other essentials for focus work, which I think now people see home as focus work. But, if you live, if you’re a young person and you’re sharing an apartment or a home, um, working from home isn’t going to work so well for you. So, you know, Marlaine and I have our own offices. She’s in my office right now. You know, you know, the dogs are, I gave them cookies and they’re in the back. So, we don’t have any problems right now, but you know, we’re both 60 and the kids are out of the house, if you know what I mean. So, if you’re living in Manhattan, it may be a different story for you. And you maybe need a workspace to go to, to get something done in a focused way. So um, a lot of conditions that can’t be just standardized and there is no one fits all approach here. It’s a deeper dive, a deeper, somewhat complicated conversation. And I think you’re seeing a lot of evolution in the workspace design around free addressing systems where people have no permanent workspace. And that also has to do with generations like. Xers and boomers who are still in the workspace want their own space, but millennials and Zs don’t care if they have the same office every day. So, they just want to work with their teams and wherever their team goes, they go.
MARK WRIGHT 38:26
We boomers are like, who moved my picture? That’s awesome. Marlaine, because the dust hasn’t really settled yet, um, how are companies planning for the future at this point?
MARLAINE MCCAULEY-WATSON 38:40
Well, that’s a good question. I, it’s, uh, for the first time, I think in the 26 years, um, it’s different for every company. Um, where we could sort of anticipate, you know, what tech might be doing or health care or, you know, commercial businesses, professional services, etc. Um, it, there’s just no predicting, no, no commonality.
MATT WATSON 39:07
I call it analysis paralysis. Everybody’s frozen and just not sure of the next move.
MARLAINE MCCAULEY-WATSON 39:13
Right. Waiting to see what happens or what, you know, I think Seattle is, uh, and it might be the reason why the, the return to work hasn’t been as robust as other parts of the country is. I do feel they need to get the downtown core figured out, uh so a people feel safe going back to work. Um, a lot of the businesses that supported those, you know, Amazons and other companies, a little coffee shops and restaurants and whatnot. They may not be there anymore. Um, and I think the city council really does need to, um, figure out a way to address the downtown issues. Um, before we’ll see any meaningful return to work downtown Seattle, I see Bellevue is way more vibrant. Um, and so, um, but you know, we just meet each client where they’re at, what is, what’s their specific journey, what are they trying to accomplish and it could, in Dallas, it’s going to be completely different than what we might see in another part of the country. So, we just are very, we tailor everything to that individual company and what their needs are.
MARK WRIGHT 40:25
Um, it seems like, um, I’m just wondering, why didn’t we see the value of remote work sooner? I mean, I feel like a lot of it had to do with cultural expectations of what work is and where people should be when they quote unquote work I and I you know is that do you share that?
MARLAINE MCCAULEY-WATSON 40:42
Well, I think it’s a generational thing that if I don’t see you working, you’re not working and,
MATT WATSON 40:50
That’s the boomer. That’s the boomer.
MARLAINE WATSON 40:51
It, it’s a generation I see it as a generational thing and, and then personality type as well where introverts really, you know I um, prefer to work from home and, uh, so, you know, the extroverts want to be around each other and want to be mingling, and they were really struggling during the pandemic. So, um, uh, I hope that answered your question.
MATT WATSON 41:21
There’s a huge push into neurodiversity right now among the A&D community architects and designers. Um, I’ve always looked at it going, hey man, you know, we’ve been called into quiet space down, put in sound masking, reconfigure space so that people aren’t disturbed and upset, you know, and interrupted in the work they do in the focused work they do. I, I, I think it’s really hard to design space around particular employees with special issues because the hard part is they may not be with you tomorrow. I mean, so the hard thing is, is you have to consider the whole and design that, uh, that beats, I say meets 90% of the need and 10% will always be a problem, no matter what you try to do. So, but I think the other part is technologies caught up and Marlaine’s right, the generational shift, the boomers, uh, we just crested the retirement of the boomers, as we know, last year. And we’re seeing now that there will always be more jobs for the next at least 10 years, maybe 15 years. There’ll always be more jobs than employees because of the boomer exit. Massive generation.
MARK WRIGHT 42:34
Yeah. Huge shift. And I don’t know if it was when you and I spoke, Matt, a couple of weeks ago, but, um, I didn’t realize that, you know, people are like, well, why don’t you just transition those office buildings into condos? And it’s like, um, those things are built from the ground up specifically for that purpose and it’s poured in concrete by the way, right? So, it’s like you to retrofit these huge office buildings. It’s just massively too expensive, isn’t it?
MATT WATSON 43:00
Yeah, the infrastructure of an office building is not set up for say a condominium style infrastructure where you have a lot of plumbing and electrical and mechanical that supports individual units. Uh, these big floor plates, some 10, some 15,000, some even 20,000 square feet. You know, they just have a small corridor of bathrooms and maybe a break room for water and, you know, that’s it. So, if you think about it, they, the things that I’m seeing and also that this has been a problem for many, many years because these buildings have always been one dimensionally planned and developed. Um, and now we’re facing the crux of this problem in a big, big way. Ironically, ironically, the older buildings that have smaller floor plates lend themselves better to being refitted for residential usage rather than these bigger buildings, these modern buildings with new technology. So that’s ironic. And you know, before the class B space and the class C space was just being tossed aside for these new high rises that are all fancy class A buildings. But now the class A, many of them class A-minuses – big trouble, big trouble. Interest rates went up. Uh, occupancy went down, and leases aren’t getting renewed and there is going to be a reckoning for many owners.
MARK WRIGHT 44:24
Well, that’s, that’s going to be really interesting to, to see, um, I’d love for you both to give some advice to maybe that business owner who is just trying to figure it out. I mean, every business owner that I know is still really just trying to figure out where things are headed next, and it’s got to be really unsettling for them. Do you, do you have any just basic advice on from your perspective in terms of facilities planning and execution? Like what, what, what should they be keeping in mind?
MARLAINE MCCAULEY-WATSON 44:55
Um, that’s a good question. Um, you know, uh, making some of those hard decisions faster than they may feel comfortable doing. I mean, I think, uh, I always am looking and planning six months ahead and looking at, so I consume a lot of news, looking for, uh, shifts. Things that, like, our clients might be experiencing, um, that we can be prepared for or say, hey, I heard something. Um, how can we help you in that change that you, that sounds like is coming? But, uh, it’s, it’s hard and it’s especially hard for the person who’s a small business owner trying to do everything themselves. And maybe they’re doing some things to save costs that they’re not really good at doing. So, you know, get help. You know, go find that person that can free you up to do this. I always say, are we doing our highest and best use work? 80% of our days should be spent on that. And of course, there’s always the 20%. Um, and I think that leads to better job satisfaction or just work satisfaction. So, you know, the stuff that we’re not good at, get someone to help. Who’s really good at it and loves to do it because that should free up that business owner to then go do more of what their highest and best use is.
MATT WATSON 46:23
I would only add that, you know, we started this business or Marlaine started the business and I joined the business with the focus on helping and providing the services to manage change, change at that time was progressing pretty quickly, not as fast as it is today. I mean, we’re on the hockey stick, and we’re on the actual stick part. We’re off the, the, whatever the time hitting thing is we’re, we’re, we’re off of that. We’re on a steep incline of change. We, you know, so what happens now is you need to make quick decisions, um, and get the right people around you. I mean, our focus again is helping clients. And we, you know, my podcast is also about how, um, entrepreneurs are navigating change in the workspace and that whole process has the rules change every day. You do not know. I mean, the willingness to say you don’t know is probably more valuable than thinking, you know, because you think, you know, you’re going to make mistakes along the way. So opening up and allowing, um, uncertainty and I, what I call the suffer muscle, you start exercising that suffer muscle and I don’t know if this is going to be right, but I’m standing in the question and I’m going to, you know, and then we’ve always delivered, um, advice on multifunctional designs, uh, furniture that can be reconfigured easily, um, changeable workspace interiors. We’ve always, you know, promoted that concept, not a fixed in place. solution that will need to be changed tomorrow. The rate of change is so great that as soon as we install something, we’re usually reconfiguring it a week or two or a month later. So.
MARLAINE MCCAULEY-WATSON 48:13
I, I think to the, um, you know, it’s not just around the business that most business owners are feeling stress. It’s also home life because if they’re the, you know, the, the responsible, uh, person in the, in the household to bring the money in, that’s an additional stress. Um, and you know, I felt really fortunate that Matt and I understood the demands the business put on each of us in our roles. And uh, I felt that that was actually a blessing because when I needed to stay up late, um, you know, getting an RFP turned around and out the door, he understood there wasn’t this, you know, there’s no time for me, blah, blah, blah. Um, so I felt, you know, we’re unique in that way that we both understand the, the demands. Um, but I highly encourage people to make sure they’re taking care of their mental health. Um, and, uh, you know, it is stressful and, and if they don’t have a mentor of some kind, uh, we also had really good, uh, relationships with EO members that helped us navigate some of these hard times. Um, to find somebody that they can talk to, because often it’s that 5% that you don’t, you know, a lot, a lot of people feel uncomfortable sharing with their spouse or their significant other because they’re, they don’t want to worry them. So often as business owners, we were carrying all of that burden ourselves. So just having someone else to talk to about the challenges is, can be very helpful.
MARK WRIGHT 49:49
Um, our founder, Dan Rogers, is a member of Entrepreneurs Organization as, as are you too. And I know a number of other people in that organization. And boy, it just sounds like to a person when you ask them, how much have you gotten out of EO? And to a person, they always say, I’ve gotten the best business advice I’ve ever gotten from my colleagues in EO because they’re right in the thick of it. And if they don’t know the answer, they know somebody who may have the answer. Sounds like, you know, that’s a good bit of advice for, for business owners out there who aren’t connected with organizations like you.
MATT WATSON 50:20
And ironically, it isn’t advice. It’s actually focused on a Gestalt kind of methodology that is most, if not all shared experience. So, you’re basically helping somebody overcome a problem when you discuss the problems that you’ve overcome. And from that learning and what you learned from those experiences are shared. And those are the takeaways that I think really are the really good, vital ones that people don’t get.
MARK WRIGHT 50:48
Well, this has been so much fun. I want to wrap it up with one final question, you guys, and that is what’s the biggest lesson that you’ve learned to running a successful business that you know today that you didn’t know when you started 26 years ago?
MARLAINE MCCAULEY-WATSON 51:02
Um, probably, and I don’t, I, I think it’s, um, a couple of things. Trust my gut. Um, I hired a lot of consultants that I thought would have like the secret sauce answer and realized that actually I knew a lot more about business than they did in some respects. And so, and I, you know, I mean, I’ve worked with some that are, that have been great at the time. Um, but that I, I had undervalued my own knowledge and ability to, um, you know, navigate complex business issues. So, uh, that, that’s one, uh, took me a long time to figure that out and then, um, uh, be humble and not feel you’re the smartest person in the room because the one, the, the folks who are actually doing the work probably have insights that those of us who aren’t in it day after day. Um, 24/7, we just don’t know, so, you know, I like to get the input, I like to get input from a lot of, um, the employees who actually have to implement, um, the crazy ideas we have sometimes. Um, because they’ll give you that little nugget of information that might change the whole trajectory and, and, uh, either make it really easy to execute or you say, uh, I don’t think that’s a, with that new piece of information, I don’t think we should go forward with that plan. So.
MARK WRIGHT 52:30
Yeah, like Matt was saying how to move a piano. I mean, you don’t ask a manager how to move a piano. Matt, what about you? What have you learned?
MATT WATSON 52:41
Um, I think that a couple things. One, to stay curious. Um, the hard part for me is I always like to know and be the smartest guy and, you know, try to be right all the time. And that’s my personality. I’m a bit of a narcissist that way. And so, I had to recognize that, you know, that’s a mistake. That doesn’t allow others around you to learn and grow and develop. And you’re not being a great coworker and mentor when you’re always being right, and others are being wrong. So, being, um, open and curious, uh, and, uh, standing in the question and having that suffering, um, and realizing that it’s only the standing in the question is how you’re going to get through that obstacle, right? The obstacle is always the way, right? We have to go through things. I also say we’ve got a workforce, you know, of 38 people doing the work of in the past 50. And so, right people, uh, we’ve, we’ve, we’ve, I think, cracked the, the code, I guess, to understanding our DNA as an organization and we also have processes set up, pretty established processes set up to execute on, you know, we can, where we can scale, um, very quickly to the market demand. So, if something exploded tomorrow, we would be able to manage it. I mean, we’ve done massive projects on a couple of weeks’ notice, and this is not unusual. And for us, um, and large organizations, they would say, no, we can’t do it. We just don’t have the resources and you get shut down. So. You know, we’re still small enough to be flexible and nimble, and that’s always been inflexible. Those have always been our winning formula.
MARK WRIGHT 54:19
Yeah, well, this has been so much fun. I’ve learned a ton from both of you and just super inspired at how you both are redeeming work, by the way. Well, just the way that you show up in the world and also in the way that you run your company and the services that you provide. I’d love to touch base with you both at some point in in the future because um where this thing shakes out is really going to be fascinating to see what happens with all that office space in cities like downtown Seattle. So, Marlaine, Matt Watson, thank you so much for spending some time on the BEATS WORKING podcast and all my best to you and your business. Let’s stay in touch.
MATT WATSON 54:53
It’s been a pleasure.
MARLAINE MCCAULEY-WATSON 54:54
Thank you for having us
MARK WRIGHT 54:56
You bet. Thanks. I’m Mark Wright. Thanks for listening to BEATS WORKING, part of the WORKP2P family. New episodes drop every Monday. And if you’ve enjoyed the conversation, subscribe, rate, and review this podcast. Special thanks to show producer and web editor Tamar Medford. In the coming weeks, you’ll hear from our Contributors Corner and Sidekick Sessions. Join us next week for another episode of BEATS WORKING, where we are winning the game of work.
