Workero CEO Dirk Paelinck spoke at the European Commission’s annual SME Assembly during ‘The New Workplace’ masterclass about the future of workspace and how it is adapting to the change in work patterns.
What is the European Commission’s Annual SME Assembly?
According to the European Commission, the SME assembly is the most significant event for small and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) in Europe. The conference takes place once a year during the European SME week. Together with the network of SME envoys, the assembly creates the governance structure of the small business act.
During his talk, Dirk discussed the current trends that are influencing SMEs & the real estate industry, both on a macro-economic level and on a technological level. How these are impacting our workforce is of vital importance to startups and business leaders. He explained how these elements are resulting in a reduction of office square metres within companies’ office real estate portfolio, and an increase in the need for flexibility.
COVID-19 has increased this existing flexible working trend and coworking’s popularity. Dirk Paelinck here explained what, according to him, the future of workspaces and SMEs will look like, and how they will centre around collaboration, co-creation and innovation, whilst putting the user needs at the heart of development. He further looked at the role of PropTech to facilitate this change in what people expect from the workspace.
To support these statements, he looked at Workero’s flexible workspace network and integrated workplace management software as a case study.
Watch his full Future Workspace talk here:
The Annual Assembly is the go-to event for SMEs in Europe and those that support them. This year the assembly, which took place virtually, was co-hosted by the German Presidency and focused on the implementation of the SME Strategy to help economic recovery and to build further resilience and sustainability into the European enterprise ecosystem.
