TUTCRIS Research Portal

TY - JOUR

T1 - From walls to experience – servitization of workplaces

AU - Petrulaitiene, Vitalija

AU - Korba, Pia

AU - Nenonen, Suvi

AU - Jylhä, Tuuli

AU - Junnila, Seppo

N1 - EXT="Petrulaitiene, Vitalija"

PY - 2018/7/2

Y1 - 2018/7/2

N2 - Purpose: New ways of working challenge workplace management: increasing mobility and diminishing organizational boundaries require re-evaluation of both workplace design and service delivery. However, structures and processes of workplace management are still traditional, and managers, together with outsourced facility service providers, often do not succeed at fulfilling the needs of mobile employees. The aforementioned changes stimulate discussions in many areas in both industry and academy. Nevertheless, workplace literature from business perspective seems to be scarce. In this paper, the focus is on workplace service offering for mobile knowledge workers. This paper aims to study the current state of workplace servitization. To answer this, the authors identify value offering elements that are used in office business market to deliver workplace as a service. Design/methodology/approach: This study follows multiple case study methodology including five case studies. Primary data were collected through interviews with workplace service providers. Secondary data included observations and publicly available data. The authors took business model design approach to study selected business offerings. Findings: The results indicate that workplace business models include elements of servitization on various levels. Physical space is no longer the central offering in the office business; instead, it acts as a component on which the service portfolio is built. The highest value from workplace comes from experience-related service offerings. Originality/value: Academically, research contributes to the workplace management studies by providing servitization perspective to a topic previously approached with a more technical and psychological point of view. This study can also support service providers and customer organizations in their quest to make service provision more flexible and experience-oriented.

AB - Purpose: New ways of working challenge workplace management: increasing mobility and diminishing organizational boundaries require re-evaluation of both workplace design and service delivery. However, structures and processes of workplace management are still traditional, and managers, together with outsourced facility service providers, often do not succeed at fulfilling the needs of mobile employees. The aforementioned changes stimulate discussions in many areas in both industry and academy. Nevertheless, workplace literature from business perspective seems to be scarce. In this paper, the focus is on workplace service offering for mobile knowledge workers. This paper aims to study the current state of workplace servitization. To answer this, the authors identify value offering elements that are used in office business market to deliver workplace as a service. Design/methodology/approach: This study follows multiple case study methodology including five case studies. Primary data were collected through interviews with workplace service providers. Secondary data included observations and publicly available data. The authors took business model design approach to study selected business offerings. Findings: The results indicate that workplace business models include elements of servitization on various levels. Physical space is no longer the central offering in the office business; instead, it acts as a component on which the service portfolio is built. The highest value from workplace comes from experience-related service offerings. Originality/value: Academically, research contributes to the workplace management studies by providing servitization perspective to a topic previously approached with a more technical and psychological point of view. This study can also support service providers and customer organizations in their quest to make service provision more flexible and experience-oriented.

KW - Business models

KW - Facilities management services

KW - Mobile work

KW - Services

KW - Servitization

KW - Workplace

U2 - 10.1108/F-07-2017-0072

DO - 10.1108/F-07-2017-0072

M3 - Article

VL - 36

SP - 525

EP - 544

JO - Facilities

JF - Facilities

SN - 0263-2772

IS - 9-10

ER -