Question 1

What is Desk Booking?

Accepted Answer

Desk Booking is the possibility to reserve a desk or workplace in advance, so employees are guaranteed of a workplace when they arrive at the office. It has many benefits in the hybrid or flexible workplace, and/or even businesses that use the Hot Desking model. Plan your own workweek by deciding on your own when you want to visit the office and at what desk you’d like to work. Maybe a desk next to your favourite co-worker, or a desk in a more silent environment for focused work setting.

To enable all this, you need a desk booking system. Most businesses choose for a desk booking system at the office to provide employees with certainty or to be able to manage occupancy at the office. Both reasons are becoming increasingly important, especially considering the rising popularity of hybrid working.

GoBright offers a Desk Booking system, which allows employees to reserve a desk in advance, both from home and as soon as they arrive at the office.

Question 2

What are the benefits of a Desk Booking System?

Accepted Answer

Implementing a Desk Booking system into your office environment has several benefits for both the employees and the employer.

1. Facilitates new ways of working

We know that flexible working, or Hybrid Working, is becoming increasingly popular. People want to decide for themselves when they want to come to the office, and when they would like to stay home. If they do decide to visit the office, employees want to be assured of a workplace. A Desk Booking system facilitates this for them. It also stimulates collaboration. It becomes easier to reserve a workplace close to the person you want to collaborate with. Managing the occupancy rates via a desk booking system ensures that pleasant workspaces are always available. With a desk management system, employees are able to filter and select a desk according to their own preferences. This way, you can provide employees with lots of freedom and give them control in regards to when and at which desk they want to work at the physical office.

2. Support collaboration

With desk booking, the collaboration between teams or departments is boosted. Employees can collaborate better by simply reserving desks side by side. For example, the GoBright Desk Booking Platform even has a Team Booking function designed to support these kinds of collaborations.

Besides employee benefits, using Desk Booking is also beneficial to the employer.

3. Cost effective

With desk booking software you are able to manage and control the occupancy at the office. Data that is collected gives you more insight into the way the office is being used. By gaining insight into the actual occupancy, many offices discovered they did not really need the number of desks that they had. This information can be used to make strategic data-driven decisions in regards to reshaping the office and providing your employees with the best office environment. You might even be able to get rid of some real estate costs, because you discover you have way too much office space on your hands. Cost-efficient, too!

4. Sustainability

Desk Booking encourages people to only use the space that they really need. This way, the office becomes a lot more sustainable. No more unoccupied and unnecessary costly office space.

5. Time efficiency

In most cases, not all employees will be at the office at the same time due to new working models and other changes in the office environment. Some days it might be quiet in the office, and some days it might be a lot busier than expected. Regardless of the situation, if an employee decides to come into the office, a nice workplace must be available. Using a desk booking system allows you to assess the situation at the office in advance. By being able to anticipate, you don’t waste any time going into the office and run into surprises.

6. Insight into analytics

A smart data-driven workplace is what it is all about these days. With the data derived from desk booking solutions you are able to understand employee behavior a lot better. You will get insight into how the office is being used. Why do employees often book their desks on a specific floor? What is special about these desks? Perhaps your employees like to work where there is the most natural lighting, or near the company restaurant? These are all valuable analytics that can help you optimise the office. Adapting the office to employee behavior is one of the most important ways to ensure that your office is future-proof.

7. Attract a new generation

Not to forget, the younger generation enters the job market with new ideals. Flexibility and freedom is a must for them. They don’t want to be tied to the 9 to 5 traditional office cubicle. They expect a workplace that represents their standards and accommodates their wishes. Integrating desk booking into the office fits really well with the perspective this generation has on the future office. Because the future office is a smart office.

8. Health and safety

With desk sharing, several people share the same desk at the office. You might assume that this will automatically lead to concerns in regards to health, hygiene and safety. However, there are two sides to the story here. When people use the same desk and this process is not monitored, it will indeed lead to increased risks in regards to hygiene and safety. Yet, with use of a desk booking system, this process is in fact monitored. Especially in times when safety needs to be extra emphasized (e.g. during a pandemic), the use of Desk Booking systems ensures that it does not get too crowded in the office. For example, an office manager is able to block certain desks so that a safe distance is guaranteed. Also, with control over the occupancy rate, you ensure that there are never too many people on the floor at the same time.

Even with monitoring, the fact remains desks are being used by multiple people. How is this going to be safe? GoBright has already thought about this. With the GoBright Connect, you are able to adjust your status while working at the desk. Besides the obvious “occupied” or “available”, it will also adjust to “Needs cleaning” when an employee has checked out from their desk. The facility department will automatically be alerted that the desk needs to be properly cleaned. After it is cleaned, the desk will be ‘available’ again.

In conclusion, there are many benefits to using a Desk Booking system. It supports the new way of working, stimulates collaboration, and is cost and time effective. It is also beneficial for your office’s sustainability, it attracts new talent, stimulates health and safety at the office, and provides insights into your office’s occupancy.

Question 3

What is a Desk Booking System?

Accepted Answer

A desk booking system allows employees of a business to book their workplace or desk remotely, for example from home or while traveling.

With GoBright Desk Booking, desks can be booked remotely via the online platform and via the Mobile App. This way, it is possible to book a desk before you leave for the office, so that you are guaranteed the workplace you want. You can use the search tool or the interactive Map. This Map shows exactly which desks are occupied and by whom, so you can make a well-considered choice on where you would want to work that day. Within this interactive Map, you can also find a specific colleague with the ‘Find my Colleague’-function. Just type in their name and the Map will show you where they are seated for the day!

Sometimes you need more advanced bookings. Therefore, recurring bookings are possible within the GoBright Desk Booking environment, enabling you to book a desk for multiple days or other preferred periods of time. You can also make Team Bookings, for when you want to be able to collaborate effectively with your colleagues. Team Bookings make sure you can book several desks at the same time, so you are guaranteed to be seated near each other for collaborating.

When you forget to book in advance, or prefer to book ad hoc, you can also check in at desks at your workplace whenever you arrive at the office. You can check in via the GoBright Connect or GoBright Interact on the desk, or NFC stickers. Your desk will automatically be booked by you, and visible on the Map throughout the GoBright platform for your colleague’s information. If you are cautious with your privacy, you can also book a place anonymously. People will know that the specific workplace is occupied but won’t be able to see who’s seated.

Question 4

Why do I need a Desk Booking solution?

Accepted Answer

Desk Booking allows you to manage and control the occupancy at the office. Monitoring and measuring occupancy rate has many interesting advantages. First, you can create availability for employees. With Desk Booking, employees are always secure of a pleasant workspace at the office. Also, you are able to manage hygiene. In practical terms, employers are able to customise their workspace at the office. Features such as Team Booking and ‘Find my Colleague’ which makes working at the office flexible and efficient is attracting to employees.

Desk Booking contributes to the overall positive employee experience. Attracting and retaining talent is also part of employee experience.

Managing and monitoring the occupation rate comes with interesting insights for employers. Money can be saved on real estate and energy bills. It can appear that a lot less space than intentionally thought. With Desk Booking software measurements can be made on how much office space is really needed. Also, with GoBright Analytics derived from measuring occupancy you will gain insight into employee behaviour and preferences. With accurate insights, you can re-design and optimise the office space.

Question 5

Will Desk Booking work for my office?

Accepted Answer

Desk Booking software is designed to create flexibility and availability in the office. Using such systems can help you manage and control the occupation strategy at the office. As occupation management is an indispensible aspect of office management, desk booking systems can work in any office, no matter the size.

Before you make a drastic change to your working environment, do research on the needs and wishes of the company- and its employees. Besides the many advantages, changing up your work culture and starting to use another system may come with a few downsides.

GoBright’s Desk Booking software can integrate with MS Outlook, MS Teams, Azure AD, Office 365, Microsoft Exchange, Google Workspace and more. Our many integrations make the step to a desk booking system easier and more effective.

Desk Booking in Microsoft Teams

What is Desk Booking?

How to book a desk via Microsoft Teams

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The benefits of Desk Booking in Teams

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