The Connected Workplace
Clark and Paul have been working with Cisco Systems since 1997. Over that time, services have been provided at the San Jose Headquarters, RTP Campus, U.S. Field Sales Offices (FSO), and at a variety of locations in the Asia/Pacific/Japan (APJ) region. Most recently BPS has been working with Cisco’s Workplace Resources organization (WPR) on strategies for, and implementation of their Cisco Connected Workplace.  BPS’s effort has focused on the San Jose headquarters campus with additional projects on the Raleigh campus and at specific field office sites.

Cisco recognized the misalignment and dramatic underutilization of their facilities in early 2000’s. Cisco’s corporate culture is to drive change rather than be left behind by it.  A continuous effort has subsequently been pursued to meet the needs of how Cisco employees are working - shifting from individual work to collaborative work, both in collocated settings as well as distributed work locations across Cisco’s global real estate portfolio. 

Beginning with business units interested in anything but the status quo, WPR worked on developing a new workplace model on a number of fronts:

• Proof of concept leading to program development with pilots for different lines of business and geographies and cultures.
• Synthesis of new global standards and delivery process.
• Establishing the role of change management both with the user groups and with the corporate real estate delivery teams.

Business Unit leadership has been a critical component of the overall program development and in defining success criteria. Broad organizational buy-in was required to enable and drive consistent outcomes across all geographies company-wide (globally).  The Cisco Connected Workplace now addresses new workplace models for BU’s from general and administrative, engineering, and sales.  Key features include:

• Focus on collaborative environments, with an emphasis on non-reservable spaces that are also user-reconfigurable.
• Significant application of unassigned work environments (over one million square feet at the headquarters campus).
• Leveraging mobile interactive technologies, including ubiquitous, robust wireless network access, unified communications, TelePresence and web conferencing.
• Substantially increased workspace resources including large “commons” spaces which serve as social hubs (break areas), casual meeting places, and alternative work spaces.  Other shared spaces include:
• Living Rooms: dedicated casual meeting spaces dedicated to the exclusive use of designated neighborhoods
• Garages: dedicated project rooms
• Audio privacy rooms