Office Overhaul: 5 Ways Office Spaces Will Change by 2027

Five years after the emergence of COVID-19, work patterns and attendance are finally starting to stabilize—but the office isn’t. It needs to remain flexible in the face of major changes to the way we work, such as the rise of AI.

A recent survey by Steelcase of nearly 500 U.S.-based decision-makers across industries and regions revealed a key insight—that business leaders know the office is more than commercial real estate. It’s a strategic tool. But that knowledge comes with a mandate to create spaces that can support future ways of working. Offices that can’t adapt to future needs risk becoming less functional over time—even outdated.

“Futureproofing in offices has, in some respects, been a holy grail over the years for a lot of people in the industry,” explained Chris Congdon, director of research communications for Steelcase. “The way some people have approached that is by trying to look into the future and say, ‘That’s going to be the perfect office in 10 years. What we’re learning is, that’s really an impossible quest. It’s better to think about flexibility and designing spaces that are going to be able to adapt and change, because change is constant.”

These five insights from Steelcase’s Leader Research 2025 reveal what we can expect from offices over the next couple of years.

1. Work Patterns are Settling into Place

Office building owners and managers are beginning to get a clearer picture of hybrid and in-office work behaviors, according to the research. Leaders expect almost half (46%) of employees to work in the office five days a week. The number of people expected to work in the office at least three days a week has stayed around 70% for the last two years.

“That really changes the confidence level we can have in terms of what we’re trying to design for when we think about workspaces,” Congdon said. “Some organizations are choosing to give people an individual workspace that’s assigned to them—and that’s especially prevalent with organizations asking people to be in five days a week—but think about how you begin to design workstations in a sharing model that are also complemented by a variety of other kinds of spaces.”

A larger presence in the office requires multiple space types so people can make calls or have video meetings without disrupting work for colleagues, Congdon added.

What this means for facility managers: A regular presence of about 70% capacity will help facility teams make operational decisions about spaces and floors that are in use consistently. Leaders can also make informed decisions about space design.

2. Spaces Need Updates

About 96% of leaders said they plan to update their workspaces in the next two years, naming these top four reasons why:

• Flexibility (42%)
• Spaces no longer fit work needs (38%)
• Increase in staff (35%)
• Outdated aesthetics (33%)

In addition, 78% of leaders said AI will require an office redesign, suggesting that leaders understand that AI will change not only the way people work, but the fundamentals of some workers’ jobs. Spaces need to be ready to evolve as work evolves. This could include something as simple as more screen space to make room for AI tools, or it could mean different levels of visual and acoustic privacy to help people focus and concentrate, Congdon said.

What this means for facility managers: Organizational leaders are feeling pressure to update offices to become more flexible and adaptable to accommodate not just change today, but future change—especially change driven by AI as organizations figure out how to benefit from it. Facility managers will be tasked with helping execute these updates, from space planning to ensuring lighting and MEP systems can support new ways of working and work modes.

3. The Employee Experience Rises

The Steelcase research showed that 70% of organizations represented in the research have either moved to higher-tier properties or plan to do so soon, motivated by these factors:

• High-performing spaces (58%)
• Premium aesthetics (46%)
• Proximity to commercial districts (45%)
• Adaptability of space (43%)
• Amenities in the building (41%)
• Diversity of working spaces (34%)

These factors create environments that make people want to come into the office to work without being mandated to, according to the research.

What this means for facility managers: Facility professionals are increasingly finding themselves becoming stewards of the employee experience—and a move to a different property will require facility managers to flex skills in change management and logistics. Ensuring spaces can support the work employees need to do will also require facility management knowledge and experience.

4. Workstation Sharing Requires Flexible Office Spaces

Because organizations and their facility teams are gaining more clarity around in-office attendance and hybrid work patterns, they’re also developing an understanding of how existing spaces are used. Many offices have rejected the one-to-one desk-to-employee ratio in favor of a 2:1 or higher workstation sharing ratio in response to the growth of hybrid work and a need for flexibility. Steelcase’s 2025 leader research revealed that 83% of desks are shared by more than one person at companies with desk sharing.

“Depending on the ratios of sharing, it really is about getting the balance right between the number of individual spaces you need for people to share and the other types of spaces that people want to have available to work at,” Congdon said. “For example, in our workplace, we certainly have plenty of individual spaces to work, but we also have a large table in our team area and our team ends up sitting there quite frequently. We go back and forth between, ‘I want to work with others around me in closer proximity’ or ‘I need to focus and go over to an individual space,’ or ‘I have a meeting and I need to go into a space that’s more enclosed so I can manage the acoustics.’ The key to it is having this variety of space.”

Think of your office layout like a neighborhood or community, Congdon advised. Neighborhoods aren’t uniform—there are different kinds of homes, businesses, and public spaces that people can move between.

What this means for facility managers: Facility leaders will need to identify systems to manage desk sharing. This could include worktech solutions that allow people to check out desks, or simply offering unassigned desks in a first-come, first-served scenario. The right solution for each organization depends on company culture and other factors. In addition, facility professionals should identify ways to measure who is using which types of spaces to identify which ones are most heavily used and which ones could be adjusted in the future to better serve workers.

5. Organizations Are Investing in People

Leaders in the Steelcase survey named sustainability and social issues like inclusivity, wellbeing, and belonging as other factors that are influencing the way their offices are set up. Inclusive design principles and environmental stewardship are important parts of workplace planning for the leaders in the survey, with 92% of leaders saying social issues are important and 89% saying sustainability is important.

Designing spaces that are equitable—but not necessarily equal, where everyone gets the same thing—is key to improving productivity and employee satisfaction.

“Think about spaces that are designed for equity,” Congdon said. “That comes back to that idea of having a range of spaces that allows people to select what works best for them and have control over their choice and over their day.”

What this means for facility managers: Flexible offices offer environments that can meet a wide range of needs and satisfy a variety of neurotypes, making them more inclusive from the start. Facility leaders can help lead the shift toward providing multiple space types that work for everyone with strategies like pre- and post-occupancy surveys.

“As a facility leader, think about the agility of the things you’re putting into a space,” Congdon suggested. “How easily can you reconfigure it based on the changing needs of your organization?”