A US-headquartered global financial services organisation had invested significantly in upgrading their office spaces. With hundreds of thousands of employees around the world and billions at stake, this client required clear metrics to measure return on investment and was using longitudinal Leesman employee workplace experience data to assess workplace performance. Having deployed another global Leesman survey to measure the impact of the office changes on employees, the results were unexpected – some of the sites with the most investment didn’t yield high employee satisfaction and therefore risked jeopardising desired business outcomes.

The disconnect raised important questions: were these workplaces truly meeting employees’ needs? How could future investments be better aligned with how people actually work today? The client called us in to help them answer these questions.

To understand why some offices thrived while others underperformed, we combined real-world observation with in-depth data analysis.

We conducted site visits, observing how employees interacted with their workspaces. At the same time, we analysed key workplace metrics, including:

• Leesman survey results to gauge satisfaction and engagement
• Sensor data on occupancy levels, desk usage, and meeting room bookings
• Floor plan assessments to identify layout inefficiencies and privacy concerns
• Video call frequency tracking to uncover how virtual collaboration shaped office use
• A review of live office design projects to ensure they aligned with current employee behaviours

Through this deep dive, we found that while the physical spaces were designed to a high standard, they were not optimised for the ways employees worked. The organisation needed a new set of experience-driven design principles.

Equipped with these insights, we worked with the organisation to redefine their approach to workplace design:

• Real-time adjustments were made to in-progress office projects, ensuring they better supported employees’ needs
• Design guidelines were refined to create a blueprint for future office developments
• A long-term data-driven strategy was put in place, embedding workplace experience insights into every stage of office design

By shifting from assumption-led design to an evidence-based approach, the organisation ensured that future workplace investments would deliver real impact, creating offices that not only looked good but worked better for the people using them every day.