Who said they were going to let everyone work from home indefinitely? Red Hat is doing nothing differently that any other technology company.
What does this have to do with getting a vaccine?
I haven’t seen anything indicating that Red Hat employees are being required to come back into the office, correct me if I’m wrong though. Last I heard, most employees were ‘office-flex’, and didn’t have to come into the office at all if they didn’t want to.
In regards to the vaccine, I only mentioned that because most (pretty much all) companies with mandatory vaccination policies nowadays are the ones who are forcing/requiring their employees in the office. Red Hat is doing the opposite…so it doesn’t make sense why they would have such a strict policy like that in place.
Red Hat was always ‘flexible’. Certain functions however are not as ‘flexible’. Think inside sales for example. Currently everyone is still operating under a “Covid world” so the ‘office flex’ is more pronounced as it is everywhere. This floor consolidation is a temporary measure. It will create more ‘energy’ & collaboration among the people who do show up in the office as well as cut down on costs (energy, cleaning, etc) for a temporary period of time. Nobody knows how long ‘temporary’ is these days but my prediction is after summer more corporations are going to start requiring return to office. Banks are already doing it, Red Hat is no longer a ‘cool startup’. They are owned by a dinosaur in IBM. IBM will have to wait for the ‘cool techs’ to force return to office (Google, Microsoft, Amazon, etc) before they can do it.
If Red Hat has indeed always been that flexible…I highly doubt their employees are going to volunteer to come back into the office anytime soon. Especially considering the fact that they still have this particular policy in place, over two years later…I hope I’m wrong though.
I’ll leave it alone though, don’t want us getting too off-topic.
(I can see Leo swooping in at any moment 
)
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They have no plans for back to the office. They just unloaded almost all of their parking back to the City. Its off topic but highly relevant for new office projects breaking ground anywhere near downtown. We will soon see how much Redhat space officially hits the market for sublease and adds to the hundreds of thousands of feet of shadow inventory that is already on the market downtown.
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This is a relevant discussion nationwide. Office Space vacancies are up significantly across the nation. Companies that try to force ‘back to work’ today end up losing people…especially if you are old fart like IBM…
BUT the trend is starting to shift back in favor of corporations (see layoffs) however the effect on office occupancy will probably be delayed 14 + months until the world truly feels we are out of pandemicworld.
If you notice, virtually ALL new construction starts in Raleigh (Kane is the lone exception) are residential projects. Good news is ‘new hybrid-designed’ office space is appealing & we are NOT all going to work from home forever. Companies aren’t stupid. They know a lot of people need ‘supervision’ & that they are just f##ing off at home. They just need to have the clout to force the behavior…which as I mentioned is starting. Even Apple & Google are starting to required office presence for 2-3 days.
Given Raleigh lacks HQs we are probably going to see a good long delay on new office construction. Kane is the exception here…which is good & the overall dynamics seem to be very bullish on Raleigh & RTP in general.
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Be glad that it’s residential happening in downtown now; cities reliant on office workers are taking it on the chin these days.
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That… and we have a massive housing shortage here.
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this is a bit hokie compared to raleigh ( sorry for the virginia tech reference) but in roanoke, va an interesting mixed use flex space was completed a little over a year ago. the cities hospital (and adjacent under construction cancer treatment center) is a greenway walk away, tennis courts, ball fields and a 20 mile greenway along the roanoke river are steps away…if flex space for ‘at home’ workers to occasionally congregate and collabarate with each other is a trend then this is a neat little unit. Beyond Storage — Varsity Park at 1948 Franklin
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I saw this article today on the N&O, think it’s paywalled but it’s talking the current sublet market here in the area. Looks like office space open to sublet is at an all-time high currently.
Nearly three years after the pandemic hit, the region’s office sector is still struggling to bounce back, say analysts, with roughly 3.5 million square feet of vacant sublet space currently on the market, according to CBRE Raleigh Research’s fourth quarter market report released Monday.
That’s roughly 5.9% of overall market inventory, surpassing the previous high-water mark of 5.3% witnessed in the aftermath of the dot-com bust and the 9/11 terrorist attacks.
Overall, office vacancy rose to 13.3%, up from 12.7% a year earlier.
“Leasing activity has been anemic in recent months,” Elizabeth Gates, a CBRE senior analyst, told The N&O. “The Triangle’s commercial real estate market is certainly being challenged.”
Driving the surge in sublease offerings is the “seismic shift” to hybrid work, she says. In the wake of the pandemic, many companies have now determined that they can operate effectively with a smaller footprint. Rising inflation and a spate of layoffs by high-profile companies like Google and Lenovo is also adding to the uptick.
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I read this as well. I also saw a story in one of the NYC papers talking about the big bump in sub-leasing space available in that market.
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This gets my vote, too! Who do we call to make this happen?
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Saw this information posted on urban planet from the JLL US Office Outlook first quarter 2023:
| City | Sq Ft inventory | Total Vacancy | Sq Ft under construction |
|---|---|---|---|
| Charlotte | 66,382,912 | 20.6% | 2,604,436 |
| Raleigh | 58,373,583 | 15.2% | 1,814,014 |
| Nashville | 47,409,907 | 18.9% | 2,964,053 |
| Richmond | 32,368,922 | 13.3% | not listed |
Raleigh is doing better than some of our sister cities. You can see the whole report by entering your name and email address: [US Office Outlook – Q1 2023]
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Sorry, I am not sure why the data is not lining up with the column headers. I didn’t even try to make a table.
I cleaned it up. You inspired me to check if we can make tables and we can! 
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Almost all of the numbers here are interesting to me. I didn’t realize we weren’t that far behind Charlotte in inventory and wouldn’t have guessed we were that far ahead of Nashville. Richmond having that low of a vacancy % is surprising as well.
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I think you may have lost some information when you put it in chart form.
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You’re right. How about now?
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Thanks!! characters…