#CRE #Entropy should be your next big thing.

Entropy of an isolated system can increase, but not decrease.  [Source]

I’m about to go full on geek but I’ll also keep it as simple as possible.  The 2nd law of thermodynamics says that entropy in a given closed system always increases.  To simplify greatly, this means that over time chaos increases.  Said another way, it takes energy to keep things organized and orderly but energy cannot be created from nothing; therefore the nature of the world is to become more chaotic.

You may be wondering what the hell this has to do with CRE or anything you might care about but here it is:

Over time, the use of any space will become less productive, less aligned with business need and increasingly not meet business needs.

It’s natural at this point to say “Stop pointing out the obvious.” But to many this is not an obvious point at all.  Why would that beautifully designed space that was setup only 3 years ago suddenly not be meeting the business’ needs?  Let’s go through the reasons:

• Technology is constantly improving, the building’s infrastructure and systems is now 3 years out of date.
• Businesses change, as the needs of the business shift there will be changes in workstyle – more collaboration (or less), more work from home (or less as Yahoo proved), more specialization (or less).
• Demographics change.  Either your workforce is getting younger or older.  And if it’s staying the same, it’s actually getting younger.  People of different ages desire different things from their workplace.
• Things begin to fall apart – a 3 year old workplace is going to begin fraying on some of its edges.  The paint may not be as vibrant, the carpet may be showing wear, the workstations start missing parts, not all the chairs match any longer.  It could be any number of things.

Is 3 years enough for this to start happening?  Absolutely.  The rate of change at many organizations can be every 12 months.  Turnover 3 times and the people using the space today many not look anything like the people from 3 years ago.

To keep entropy at bay in the CRE world requires investment in FF&E, people constantly addressing how people actually work, and the effort to actually drive through change.  Think about the 15 year old workplaces you walk through – how closely do those resemble the original intentions?

CRE Entropy is the way of the world.  Everything constantly is heading toward increased chaos and CRE is one of the more difficult to control – because energy often equates to money.  Nothing happens without it.  The only other way to counteract CRE Entropy is to plan for flexibility so that adaptation costs less tomorrow than it would have otherwise.