COMMENT Over the past eight weeks of EG’s Future Leaders programme, I have watched CBRE’s Callum Wyatt – who I manage in the hotels team – come together with 10 others from organisations across the industry to learn, develop and grow. The programme culminates in the excellent TED-style talks that we enjoyed in front of an audience of hundreds at last month’s Future Leaders Summit.
The unique thing about the packed Future Leaders programme is how it focuses on intensive training that teaches invaluable skills for both professional and personal growth. From sessions on generating ideas to dressing with impact, as well as recording podcasts on the future of real estate and how to effect change, it has been fantastic to watch Callum develop and nurture skills that he will treasure both in his career and outside of work. In particular, the intensive coaching on public speaking and presenting is something rarely afforded to us during our education or employment. This coaching gave the cohort a unique opportunity to develop skills that will stay with them throughout their careers, and which were excellently showcased at the summit.
Discussing and thriving
There was a real buzz in the room on the day of the summit as the cohort came together to present their ideas and pledges about what they will do to make real estate the best possible industry to work in. Topics such as cities, ESG, innovation and careers stimulated interesting discussion for us in the audience too, as we were tasked with selecting a category to focus on and form our own cohort, agreeing and working through the big changes we would like to see the real estate industry deliver in our cities, through its ESG agenda, through innovation or, indeed, with the future talent the sector needs to support for it to thrive. As senior leaders, it isn’t often that we take part in interactive learning with our peers from across the industry, but many of us agreed that doing so is a fantastic way to collaborate and improve our offering to both our business and our clients.
The range of presentations really captured the scope and complexity of our industry. They covered how to make the future of real estate inclusive, property’s role in delivering on place and how to make our cities thrive, where Callum focused on making offices an attractive place for employees to spend time in and how to make spaces meet tenants needs, especially as so many offices are now embracing a hybrid working environment.
It was particularly inspiring to hear from EG’s Future Leader alumni, who so eloquently shared their stories of development since taking part in the programme and how they’ve each brought the skills they learnt to life in their day jobs. For Callum and I, that provided real food for thought about how we would take the day’s learnings and put them into practice at CBRE.
Introducing hotelification
Callum focused on the ‘hotelification’ of our office space, which is based on the idea of making office space more aligned to the hospitality industry. He related this to the improved service, amenities and technology which hotels offer in comparison with offices and how we can adopt these functions to make offices more attractive to occupiers, subsequently increasing office attendance rates. Our CBRE UK headquarters, Henrietta House, is an example of this and showcases how we have been able to increase office attendance rates compared to offices across the UK.
On behalf of CBRE, I’d like to congratulate Callum and the rest of the cohort from across the industry on completing the EG Future Leaders programme. The activities the group has taken part in over the past few months has undoubtedly given them some valuable training opportunities and provided the chance to reflect on important themes that we are tackling as an industry, such as innovation and ESG. As the group move on from EG’s Future Leaders, we wish them all the very best in applying the knowledge they have built up over the course of the programme to their careers.
Ellina Kraynik is an associate director in CBRE UK’s hotels team
