For many office investors, 2020 has been a year of difficulty and reflection. As workers have begun returning to their desks and colleagues, their relationship with the built environment has changed. The pandemic has led people to re-evaluate what it is they go to offices for in the first place.

As an operator of both flexible office space and long-term leases, we have had a bird’s-eye view of changing demand. We have found that there is resilient demand for service, not just space. This is the case across many locations in the UK, including secondary cities such as Leeds, Exeter and Southampton, which combine supply shortfalls with a steady increase in younger office workers.

We first started to recognise this distinction as a real driver for demand back in 2016, when we launched two buildings in Glasgow. One was a fully refurbished office block, where we offered traditional leases — a blank, open space for a tenant to put their own mark on, with the usual expecta