How does personality style play a role in employee satisfaction in the workplace? In this educational session, attendees learned about Herman Miller's innovation of integrating Myers-Briggs personality profiles into their Workstyles Project. The objective was to study employee choice for a satisfying work space in a changing work environment and to find the relationship between personal work styles and space use satisfaction. The study looked at job types, personalities and work spaces in Herman Miller offices across west Michigan. Employees answered a work space questionnaire and also a Myers-Briggs assessment. The two data sets were then joined together and work spaces were designed to accommodate the work space choices of the employees.

According to Myers-Briggs, the Sensing/Intuition group was the one that most directly related to workplace satisfaction after looking at all of the Myers-Briggs types. Sensing (S) individuals prefer individual assigned space, while Intuitive (N) individuals prefer group or common space. In a time when there are often four generations working together in the workplace, S/N is a useful predictor of use and satisfaction, and does not take age or generation into consideration. The S /N scale of the Myers-Briggs profile focuses on how a person takes in information, what he or she pays attention to, and how he or she prefers to gather data. Translated to work space, the satisfaction and comfort of the environment in which one works directly relates to these two types of personalities. When an employee is allowed to work in a space that is comfortable, he or she is more likely to exhibit greater job satisfaction.

Through this study, Herman Miller has been able to design work spaces for each of these personality types and provide a variety of places and environments for people to work. Office space has been realigned to enhance the office experience through the design of individual, group and community space. The study found that job satisfaction has increased, space is utilized more efficiently, and employee turn-over rate is not a key issue - Herman Miller operates on the philosophy of attract and retain. It works - Herman Miller is recognized as one of the 10 best companies to work in the United States!

Attendees woke early to listen to Jon Schuler Brooks and Sol Arker profile a brownfield conversion they are undertaking in New York City, and the many benefits associated with such conversion. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) defines brownfields as "real property, the expansion, redevelopment, or reuse of which may be complicated by the presence of a hazardous substance, pollutant, contaminant." The EPA continues, "Cleaning up and reinvesting in these properties take development pressures off of undeveloped, open land, and both improves and protects the environment."

To that point, these nonproductive sites, often associated with Superfund, hazardous flights, and urban/suburban blight, were commonly viewed as liabilities. However, the tide began to turn in the late 1990s and early 2000s, due to both government requirements and voluntary clean up laws. Suddenly, "remediation of brownfields transformed from expense to be delayed into investment to be made." Federal, state, and municipal governments began offering incentives and special benefits to develop these "found" assets. For example, New York State, which currently offers the most lucrative incentives and serves as a model for other governments, grants program participants liability relief as well as three sets of tax credits, and eight vehicles through which the credits may be leveraged.

The Arker Companies, builders and developers of office towers and medical buildings, residential housing, and golf courses in and around New York City, faced rising prices and scarcity of location when they purchased a 2900 square foot former gas station in mid-1994. Unknown to them at the time of purchase, The Arker Companies qualified for New York's brownfield redevelopment program, and were guided to the program by Philips Nizer LLP. Fitting nicely with the company's core values to "approach projects with innovative programs for design, development, and marketing," The Arker Companies took advantage of the program as they built a mixed-use development on the former brownfield site. While there were definitely hiccups associated with redeveloping the site, The Arker Company is an active proponent of acquiring "dirty" sites, which are no longer thought of as dirty. Indeed, they are considering larger brownfield sites, and even parking lot developments to take advantage of the "unused value of all that air!"

Dynamic speaker Bill Jensen engaged the mega session audience on new rules for getting things done in today's work environment. While change management and communication are current behaviors companies are embracing, he said, "what I want to talk about is the new rule that no one has told you about until today."

He continued, "Your job is to be the employee's 'easy button.' You will have a strategic edge if, by 2010, you learn how to live by this concept."

Managers must keep in mind this behavior sometimes stands in conflict with making it easier for the company when they make it easier for the employees, but "if you are not doing it by 2010, you will be loosing your job."

Why is it so important? Jensen answers, "Because the new generation of employees are the first generation to be raised on the democratization of information." This generation, raised on Google, I-Pods, and instant messaging, will reject the hierarchical flow of information for instantaneous information delivered to them in ways they want, using new methods of collaboration, with work-level leadership, and near-total transparency.

The new rules for great managers can be reduced to two points: 1. be the occupant's champion, and 2. make it easier to get stuff done (from the employee's perspective, not necessarily the company's perspective). And get started now. Be a work-level leader, often questioning if you are looking at the tasks from the occupant's perspective, change the conversation from the company's perspective to the employee's perspective, and seek two mentors-one twice your age, and one half your age-to guide you.

It's a merger-crazed world. SBC and AT&T/BellSouth. US Airways and Delta. Blackstone and Equity Office. And of course, CB Richard Ellis and Trammell Crow Company.

The Tuesday Mega-Session on the industry's "New Order" was very much focused on trends influencing the latter two M&A's mentioned above. Only no one had heard about the $36-billion Blackstone deal until after the CoreNet Global Summit ended. So the "New Order" dialogue - driven by a highly interactive and large-scale panel of industry executives - centered on CBRE's $2.2-billion proposed buyout of Trammell Crow, which was announced 30 October.

Will the now-reawakened M&A trend continue? It's a sure bet, according to the panel.

CoreNet Global CEO Prentice Knight moderated the program, and teed up the fast-paced one-hour program inspired by the September 2006 edition of Leader magazine, which examined the "Evolving Service Provider Industry" in a special edition.

Dr. Knight noted that service delivery is still about "delivering value to the corporation," but that it's quite "different than 20 years ago." Now it's all about "how the supply side influences value and the corporate or demand side," Knight said, recalling how major companies once controlled both supply and demand with extensive portfolio ownership and large in-house real estate operations.

Then came outsourcing, first of basic functions like transactions and facility management. But, as the September Leader shows, it's evolved to a much higher level at which service providers themselves are global and are now able to integrate client portfolios on a worldwide scale in an integrated supply chain manner.

Consolidation drove service providers to this more strategic positioning but the M&A trend cooled somewhat. Now it's hot again, and it's likely to continue.

"Customer demand is driving the consolidation piece" of the industry, explained Trammell Crow Vice-Chair Bill Concannon. "CBRE is the right partner at the right time," he said of the complementary fit of the merger that will see the continuation of the Trammell Crow brand especially from the corporate and institutional service sides of the market and represents 65% of Trammell Crow's business. "You can predict the future or create it."

"We're seeing phase two" of the service industry M&A trend, observed Cushman & Wakefield's Bruce Ficke.

JLL's Richard McBlain agreed that there "almost certainly" will be more consolidation. "The industry is still very fragmented," he said, despite the considerable amount of consolidation since the late 1990's among service firms. "Large-scale client needs across multiple regions and outsourcing across multiple service lines require geographic reach." These are the key drivers, McBlain related.

Steve Stoner of Grubb & Ellis compared the commercial real estate industry trend to the world of the former "Big 8" accounting firms from which he came. "It's now down to the Big 4," he pointed out, describing both scenarios as a "rush to scale and global coverage."

With all of the progress that service companies are making toward achieving full global integration for their multinational corporate clients, the panel pretty much agreed that there's still not a single service provider who can deliver total integration on a truly worldwide scale, starting with emerging markets. End users on the panel who pressed this point included Carl Nedderman of Whirlpool, Larry Ebert of Capital One, Sean McCourt of Ford, and Ron Zappile of United Technologies.

But the drive toward total global coverage continues in earnest. Can anything stop the service provider M&A train that has left the station yet again? "The only thing that can stop it," theorized JCI's Rick Bertasi, "is a public trust issue, a real-estate Enron."

Chapters were the stars of the show at Tuesday's General Session of the 2006 CoreNet Global Florida Summit. Michelle Myer MCR, Vice President North America Real Estate & Facilities, Oracle Corporation, CoreNet Global Associate Board Member and Alice Wilson MCR, Vice President Corporate Services, LBA Realty presented the annual Chapter awards. Three categories were awarded for 2006. And the winners are:

Membership Award: Southern California Chapter
Chapter Development Award Mega Category: New York City Chapter
Chapter Development Award Large Category: Chicago Chapter
Chapter Development Award Medium Category: Philadelphia Chapter
Chapter Development Award Small Category: Connecticut/Westchester Chapter
Chapter Achievement Award: Chicago Chapter

Later in the program, Stephanie Pater and Gina Rizzo presented the annual Trailblazer Awards. For this year's campaign, the focus was on recruiting young professionals, those new members are this organization's leaders of tomorrow. Carol Adey of CRESA Partners won the Trailblazer award for 2006.

Three Chapters were honored this year with the 2006 President's Awards. The winners are the Southern California Chapter, the New England Chapter, and the Rocky Mountain Chapter.

Scott Smith of Nortel Networks, Atlanta Chapter Chair, with Charlie Sloan, Executive Director of Business Development for the Metro Orlando EDC, presented the Community Reinvestment Challenge Project for Orlando.

The project redesigning, rebuilding and landscaping a playground for the Children Home Society of Florida's Crisis Nursery, a haven for abused and neglected children. Sarah Johnston from the Children Home Society gave a heartfelt thank you to all in CoreNet Global who made this project happen.

Prentice Knight outlined his Vision for the Future of CoreNet Global, which includes the expansion of the current Learning platform and developing new methods of educational delivery.

After Hurricane Katrina hit the US Gulf Coast in August, 2005, Shell leaders jumped into action to address issues facing the largest employer in New Orleans, and declared they were returning to New Orleans and with numbers of staff similar to when they evacuated. Through innovation, leadership, and teamwork, the Shell team created a safe haven for employees and their families, places to regroup and plan the recovery, and pull their collective strength in support of this challenging effort. Shell Real Estate leaders developed an overall recovery plan for employee housing and offices, ensuring the safety and security of their employees. Taking care of their people was foremost in the recovery plan, and heroic efforts were made to provide housing for all employees and fulfill their personal needs so they could ultimately return to work. Among the recovery efforts were setting up a housing call center, acquiring temporary housing and business space, and repairing damage to One Shell Square, the tallest office building in New Orleans.

With a crisis response and business continuity plan as a foundation, Shell's Real Estate leadership team was empowered to act and make critical decisions during a time when multiple, simultaneous failures of infrastructure were creating damage and unprecedented challenges to the region. Developing a holistic plan, the team created innovative solutions, and many obstacles were overcome by challenging all assumptions. Included in the solutions were staff housing, food services, temporary office space, and efficient communication plans and procedures. Also valuable to the team were the partnerships and strong relationships with suppliers, and Shell tapped into their supplier networks, and called on them for assistance.

One Shell Square was the hub of operations for Shell in New Orleans, so efforts began at once to preserve the building and restore it to full operation. It sustained wind and water damage, but was not severely damaged. Work began almost immediately to get it back into condition for Shell to return to New Orleans. To show Shell's commitment to return to New Orleans, Shell renegotiated their lease and extended it by 9 years.

Six months after the hurricane hit, 1,300 employees and contractors were back at work in New Orleans, in addition to many more employees and contractors throughout the state. Shell is the largest employer to return to New Orleans, and has set a standard for an organization's response to community disaster.

As a result of this endeavor Shell Real Estate demonstrated a global response to local needs. It established SRE as a trusted business partner and gave the team an opportunity for SRE staff to provide support in other areas of the organization. It also set a benchmark for other organizations to develop crisis plans and offered many learned lessons of how a company can spring into action and achieve greatness by caring first for its people and their well-being. Everyone who attended this session was deeply moved by the Shell Katrina story.

Bowles began the discussion with results from CoreNet Global's most recent Experts Survey regarding Workplace trends. Results show that trends like home working and desk sharing are still not widespread, but momentum is building.

Hood discussed the Hewlett Packard Workplace Project. The project advocates rethinking the corporate portfolio with focus on employee productivity and collaboration. The company has condensed its own portfolio into smaller core sites. "But if you think only about the cost, you will fail," Hood said.

His group is designing for the people who actually come into the workplace each day: How they work, what they do. Specifically, the group is finding new ways to consider:

• Ergonomics - more people sitting in different kinds of environments
• Range of Workplaces - They are offering a variety of environments that are enclosed, semi-enclosed, and open/collaborative

Kampschoer discussed measurement techniques and how they apply to production. His group measured individual production vs. group production. He said they discovered that production increased dramatically when employees were engaged with a group.

Unfortunately, management worked in low-interaction areas along walls and in closed-off offices. Now, management has moved to more interactive zones and as a result works more effectively with employees.

"It's not easy to do these measurements," Kampschoer said. "but, it is important to do."

At Capital One, Ratekin explained, they decided to rethink the way their associates work. Through the company's Future of Work program, employees are able to select the spaces in which they work, depending on their needs. Before the vice presidents and higher were moved out of the corner office and into "kitchen table" environments, they universally opposed the idea. Now that those same executives have experienced the Future of Work program, they are the initiative's biggest advocates.

Beaudoin discussed the concept of a CoreNet Global databank that stores these kinds of stories. The idea is that this clearinghouse of case studies can be sortable by industry, metrics, project, or more specific sub-categories, allowing users of the database faster access to the latest thinking and innovations in the workplace.

The U.S. Supreme Court acknowledged in the University of Michigan case, "American businesses have made clear that the skills needed in today's increasingly global marketplace can only be developed through exposure to widely diverse people, cultures, ideas, and view points." Yet, in corporate real estate, much like the rest of the corporate world, women hold only two percent and African-Americans only one percent of senior, or C-suite, leadership positions in the United States.

What is diversity and why is it important? Not just about protected classes as defined by Title VII of the Civil Rights Act like race, sex, and nationality, diversity is about inclusiveness and respect for all differences. Further, workplace diversity is an absolute necessary thing to do to create a competitive advantage and maintain competitive parity. Today, women represent a majority of people graduating from college across all demographics, and 85 percent of net new people in the workforce are people of color, women, and people born outside of the United States. Moving out of the changing talent pool are white men who were born inside the United States, thus, providing opportunities for companies to recruit, retain, and build a diverse workforce.

If diversity is a priority for a company, Janet Crenshaw Smith pointed out that the company must remember that diversity is not a 'yield' issue in which recruitment and retention can be separated. She explained that companies might face challenges such as experiencing difficulty in recruiting people of diverse backgrounds and cultures when candidates do not see themselves throughout the organization. She also pointed to diversity landmines that lend to retention problems-attitudes such as "we've always done it that way" and "I'm all for diversity as long as it doesn't hurt our standards." Even worse for recruitment and retention is what Smith has branded MicroTriggersTM like when someone tells a person of color "you're so articulate!" Instead of flattering, these "compliments" imply surprise that the person on the receiving end exceeded the speakers' expectations of sub-par behaviors and traits. Only when such challenges are met, where diversity is tolerated, accepted, then valued, will the company experience the benefits of diversity.

Jack Van Berkel of CB Richard Ellis and Jane M. Stevenson of Heidrick & Struggles presented the second half of the session, a case study of CB Richard Ellis' diversity program. Diversity makes sense, Van Berkel explained, because it leads to above average returns on investment and accelerated business performance; it is a bottom line driver. To promote diversity a company needs leadership, metrics, and awareness. Stevenson exclaimed, "the picture of diversity in commercial real estate is stark, but the leadership profile is even starker." To change the tide, CB Richard Ellis (CBRE) sought to incorporate viewpoints that reflected the broader workforce, which may serve as a model for other companies.

Challenges such as a lack of internal leadership, lack of competitors' leaders to steal, the time it takes to develop a person into a leadership position, especially when time becomes a factor, and the mentality that requires leader to have "earned their stripes" all affect diversity programs, however, these issues are not insurmountable. Solutions such as hiring now and developing bench strength for 5 to 10 years out, developing management and leadership taken from other sales-driven industries, and a mandate driven from the top will all come together to provide your company a leadership profile reflecting the US and global workforce. Only then will your company experience the competitive advantage of diversity that will drive your bottom line returns higher and higher.