The Future of the Workplace

November 5, 2020

The Empire Club of Canada Presents

The Future of the Workplace

Chairman: Antoinette Tummillo, President, Board of Directors, Empire Club of Canada

Moderator
Mary Rowe, President & CEO, The Canadian Urban Institute

Distinguished Guest Speakers
Veni Iozzo, Executive Vice-President, Enterprise Real Estate and Workplace Transformation, CIBC
Sarah McKenzie, Independent Consultant, Innovation and Future of Work
Toni Rossi, BPHE, ICD.D, President, Real Estate Division, Infrastructure Ontario

Introduction
It is a great honour for me to be here at the Empire Club of Canada today, which is arguably the most famous and historically relevant speaker’s podium to have ever existed in Canada. It has offered its podium to such international luminaries as Winston Churchill, Ronald Reagan, Audrey Hepburn, the Dalai Lama, Indira Gandhi, and closer to home, from Pierre Trudeau to Justin Trudeau; literally generations of our great nation's leaders, alongside with those of the world's top international diplomats, heads of state, and business and thought leaders.

It is a real honour and distinct privilege to be invited to speak to the Empire Club of Canada, which has been welcoming international diplomats, leaders in business, and in science, and in politics. When they stand at that podium, they speak not only to the entire country, but they can speak to the entire world.

Welcome Address by Antoinette Tummillo, President, Board of Directors, Empire Club of Canada
Good afternoon, fellow directors, past presidents, members, and guests. Welcome to the 117th season of the Empire Club of Canada. My name is Antoinette Tummillo. I am the president of the Empire Club and your host for today's virtual event, "The Future of Workplace," featuring Veni Iozzo, Sarah McKenzie, Toni Rossi, and Mary Rowe.

Now, to begin this afternoon, I'd like to acknowledge the land we are broadcasting from is the Traditional Territory of many nations, including the Mississaugas of the Credit, the Anishinaabeg, the Chippewa, the Haudenosaunee, and the Wendat Peoples, and is now home to many diverse First Nations, Inuit, and Métis Peoples. We also acknowledge that Toronto is covered by Treaty 13 with the Mississaugas of the Credit. For those of you tuning in from regions across the country today, we encourage you to learn more about the Traditional Territory on which you work or live.

Now, I do want to take a moment to recognize our sponsors, who generously support the Empire Club and make these events possible. Our Lead Event Sponsor today is Hydro One, and our Season Sponsors are the Canadian Bankers Association and Waste Connections Canada. I also want to thank Our Event Sponsor, VVC and livemeeting.ca, for webcasting today's event.

Now, before we begin, I have a few logistical items to go over with you. First, if you are finding your internet feed is slow, please see below and click the "Switch Streams" button, and don't hesitate to press the "Request for Help" button if you are experiencing technical difficulties. Our team will be happy to assist you.

It is now my pleasure to call this virtual meeting to order. This unexpected pandemic forced most of us out of our offices in the middle of March. So many still haven't been back. The lockdowns and mandatory work-from-home were designed to slow down the spread of COVID-19. This has forced us to leverage technology and adapt to new ways of collaborating, while staying productive, addressing unforeseen crises, and human resources needs. The new reality has prompted questions among the real estate industry leaders, as well as business managers and workers, such as: what does the future of workplace look like? Has the way we work shifted indefinitely, do we still need bricks-and-mortar to be more productive—to be most productive? Will work-from-home become a permanent fixture? Will it lead to the need for less external office space? And will this be the new focus of technology companies? Today, we will hear from a panel of experts who are working through these questions with their organization and will share their perspectives.

Let me introduce you to our panel. Veni Iozzo is Executive Vice-President, Enterprise Real Estate and Workplace Transformation at CIBC. In this role, she has overall responsibility for providing strategic direction and leadership for CIBC's Global Workplace Experience Strategy. This includes accountability for creating a forward-thinking workplace design that enables a purpose-driven client culture. Veni has over 30 years' experience in the financial services industry, is a two-time recipient of Canada's Top 100 Most Powerful Women award, and is a Top 100 mentor for female leaders, as well as a member of the International Women's Forum.

Sarah McKenzie is an independent consultant. Throughout her career, Sarah has helped organizations, including tech startups, Fortune 500 companies, and the Canadian Forces, undergo transformations to adapt to the increasingly digital workplace. Sarah leads work at Community at Communitech, looking forward to the future of its workplace. She is also involved in pilot initiatives in the Waterloo region Future of Work and Learning Coalition.

Toni Rossi, President, Real Estate Division, Infrastructure Ontario. Welcome back to the Empire Club, Toni. Toni has been a commercial real estate professional for 27 years. In her role, she leads the overall management of the Province of Ontario's general real estate portfolio. Recently, Toni served as IO's Interim President and CEO, as President of the Lending Division, and was also a key member of the executive team merging Ontario Realty Corp and Infrastructure Ontario. Toni currently serves as a director on the national board of Habitat for Humanity Canada and serves on Ryerson's Real Estate Advisory Board, Urban Land Institute Advisory Board, and the Federal Provincial and Territorial Public Sector Realty Committee. She was recently elected as a director of the Canadian REALPAC Association.

Our moderator today is Mary Rowe, President and CEO of the Canadian Urban Institute. Welcome back to the Empire Club, Mary. Mary is a leading urban advocate and civil society leader, who has worked in cities across Canada and the United States. Previously, Mary served as Executive Vice-President of the Municipal Arts Society of New York, as well as President of the Canadian Platform, Ideas That Matter. She has also been a frequent contributor to national and international city-building programs, including UN Habitat and World Urban Forum.

Now, I just want to remind everybody that this is an interactive event, so please take advantage of the question box to the right of your screen and let us know what's on your mind. We've reserved some time at the end to ask the panellists questions, so please send your questions in. So, Mary, over to you.

Opening Remarks by Mary Rowe, President & CEO, The Canadian Urban Institute
Thanks, Antoinette. I'm delighted to be back with the Empire Club and to be with such an esteemed group of—as everyone will notice—women. And in fact, we've asked Antoinette to stay on the panel with us, because she's a long-time industry leader in real estate. And this is a sector that has been predominantly dominated by men, and we have all women, so we thought we'd just mark that moment and acknowledge that these folks are all trailblazers, and—Sarah, you're probably too young to be a trailblazer, but you could be. But you haven't been quite added as quite as long as some of your other panel members here.

And I think we're at a moment of transformation. Cities are changing, urbanism is changing. There's probably a lot of this was happening before COVID, but boy oh boy. COVID acted like a particle accelerator. I was borrowing a phrase that had been used by the sociologist in New York, Eric Kleinenberg, who had described a situation in Chicago with a big fire in the '90s that killed people, and he was trying to analyze why it had happened, why in some neighbourhoods more people died than other neighbourhoods. And what he determined—he was a young grad student—he determined it was because of the way that those neighbourhoods have been planned, and the actual structure of the units and the relationship that people had with amenities around them that actually influenced the capacity of those neighbourhoods, people in those neighbourhoods, to survive during a heat wave. And he said that that heat wave had acted like a particle accelerator. Inequality before became, you know, fatal for people. And we're seeing the same in COVID.

We've had a bit of a conversation about this when I was on a couple of weeks ago, around the disproportionate impact of COVID on communities of Colour, lower-income communities. And, and I think this conversation about downtown is critical to have, because of course, the workforce that comes into downtown is a very diverse workforce, and it's a lot of service workers, it's, and it's diverse by ethnic and racial composition. But it's also diverse in terms of income, and it's certainly diverse in terms of what people come downtown to do. They may be office workers, they may be service workers, they may be entertainers, they may be, they may be, you know, engaged in a particular aspect of a sector that these folks will represent, and, and that has traditionally, those sectors, real estate, finance, have traditionally aggregated downtown. So, all these conversations are really helpful for the Empire Club to be stimulating. And I think that we don't know how that we're gonna, we don't know how our urban communities are gonna look after COVID. There were—and then we have immediate challenges right now. What do they look like right now? And of course, most people aren't going into an office—not most, but a large chunk of people are not going into the office.

So, the only other thing I'm going to say is that—it's a very Canadian comment—all of us are familiar with what it's like to be having a session like this, you know, while the World Junior Hockey Championship is happening, or there's a Stanley Cup final on or something. And you have to always have your ear kind of tuned to think—oh gee, I'm old enough to remember when Paul Henderson scored the big goal, and I remember everybody's, I was in high school at the time, everybody stopped, he scored that goal, right? So, we're in a similar state. And I'm appreciative that people are taking a moment, here, to focus on the future of office, when in fact they also have an eye to the New York Times, or MSNBC, or Fox, or CNN, to see whether or not, where Nevada goes. So, if we were in a big crowd, we'd be able to have a little group hush. If those results are going to be announced while we're online, we won't be able to do that collectively. But I'm just conscious that you're taking time out of your day to be with us, but we know that you're also listening to something on the side. And there goes Toni confirming my instinct, checking TV screening to see whether something is flashed off.

Toni Rossi, BPHE, ICD.D, President, Real Estate Division, Infrastructure Ontario
No news yet, Mary. There is no news. Nevada is still, still waiting.

Mary Rowe
No news. And, you know, we're at times—and this just reinforces this—times of great change, and great upheaval. And so, let's talk about the future of office. And I'm going to go to Veni first, because she's in this business. And the financial sector is an enormous, has traditionally had people working in offices. It's an office-based sector. And I'd be interested for you to talk to us a little bit about what's the experience at CIBC. What are you seeing within your own company, but also what are you seeing within the sector? And at some point, I want to talk about what's happening in branches. But let's just talk specifically, give us your perspective, could you, for what's happening, and....

Veni Iozzo, Executive Vice-President, Enterprise Real Estate and Workplace Transformation, CIBC
Yeah, absolutely. And Mary, as you said, a lot was actually going on before the pandemic. And I think it's important just to kind of start there, set a bit of context, and then get into a bit of the pandemic. So, it did start, you know, didn't start with the pandemic. This has been a multi-year journey to drive innovation and efficiency. And, you know, for us, yeah, Antoinett mentioned earlier, you know, CIBC Square, our new global headquarters, that I am leading that effort, it's not just about a beautiful new building, you know. It was about a client-focused culture and transformation, designing a flexible space, uniquely tailored to foster, you know, greater collaboration and innovation on behalf of our clients. So, for example, you know, building an activity-based environment, intentionally designed with a variety of work modes that support different styles of preferences and activities, such as focus, collaborate, learning, social, relationship, connection. So, it was already moving from a one-size-fits-all space with traditional hierarchical environment tethered—you know, we, we were all tethered to our offices, or cubicles—to more of a non-hierarchical, untethered, mobile environment, focused on outcomes.

But I think even more importantly would be also, carefully ensuring that you're stacking your buildings or your office spaces with teams to create that right working adjacencies between business partners and equally important, community inclusion and well-being, purposely incorporated throughout, you know, whether they be specialty spaces like conference centres, or cafes, or anything like that, having employee ecosystems that support working horizontally to drive creativity and collaboration, which is key. Destination spaces for various modes of type of work, whether that be a cafe, library, or hub. And then that whole open staircase, you know, to encourage well-being, creates fluidity and connection. With, again, importance to think about the health and safety.

And health and safety—because I'm going to get into the pandemic—health and safety would be top of mind. And health and safety comes in many factors, from the health and safety that we're dealing with with the pandemic, and health and safety as it relates to your own well-being. So, simple things to think about. The right to light, you know, was one of the things that we actually took pride in as, as far as, even, CIBC Square. If you think about most of our work environments—and, and many of you worked in financial services and stuff like that. The traditional setting offices by the window, everybody else by the cubicles. Well, this is flipped on its head. All where the creativity and where the work happens, it's all by the windows, the meeting rooms are in the centre. You know, again, and how does that make everybody feel? With that outdoor green space, ensuring that there's all-gender washrooms on every floor, ensuring that we have lactation suites for breastfeeding moms as part of that, you know, fitness centres and well-being rooms. So, for us, that started pre-pandemic—and many were on this journey of looking at how do you encourage productivity, innovation, and collaboration.

But when the pandemic hit, I would say it's really important to note that in financial services, it's an essential service. So, 18,000 were—18,000 just at our bank—still working on-site, right from the get-go, to support clients, and being on-site critical to some roles. And we needed to be there, like our banking centers, like our contact centres. The remaining 28,000 successfully pivoted to remote work, because of all the work that had been done leading up to this. So, strong foundation. But, and what we learned, and what I would say, we always had remote in our assumptions. But I think what we've learned, what this pandemic has taught us, is that roles we hadn't even considered for remote work were now able to do work, like contact centre agents, like some operations roles, that we didn't consider in the past. So, that was a really good learning for us.

And we saw accelerated adoption of digital, which is critical to be successful if you're going to work remote. So, leaders, you know, working through this, leaders have to get comfortable with managing to outcomes, rather than the time spent at the office. That was another key thing that I think as leaders we've learned through this, was, you know, how do you manage the outcome? It's no longer about I see the person in every day, and assuming that they're productive. What are those things that we're actually looking for from a productivity standpoint? So. I would say for anybody that had trouble with that, of thinking about remote in any of their operating environment. Covid has really taught us, this crisis has really taught us, a lesson around how to advance that in real-time.

Mary Rowe
Yeah, I want to move to you, Sarah, next on tech, because then Veni started to talk about that. But Veni, before we leave you, I mean, our, I was aware that corporations downtown, in downtown environments, were spending enormous amounts of money converting offices, moving away from closed offices, creating these big shared open spaces, enormous amounts of money creating interior staircases. Is there anybody saying, "Oy yoy yoy, were we thinking?" Because in fact, those spaces now aren't safe, you can't—I did the same thing in a very small scale at CUI. We opened up our offices, we didn't have, you know—so now, when I try to think about getting reintroduced and people coming back, I've got to really rethink that, because a big open shared space is actually not as easy to make safe. So, is anybody in the bank saying, "Oy yoy yoy did we do the wrong thing?"

Veni Iozzo
Oh. Well, the first thing I started to pull together was a COVID playbook, right? And how you actually adapt open space to that. I, you know, what I would say is the, actually the open space is a lot easier to adapt to some of the health and safety than the some of our legacy portfolio that has offices and cubicles. There's, you know—and one of the things that, again, if you weren't building from just a space and you were building from a cultural standpoint, you were actually building to ensure that space allowed, enabled that productivity.

So, what that typically would mean is things like having wider pathways so that people could have that natural collision. Well, that's now ended up serving us well...

Mary Rowe
Yeah.

Veni Iozzo
...when you think of two meters of distancing. All of a sudden, the open space and having more open collaboration spaces is actually the way to go, than trying to squeeze into a three-person meeting room that should be probably just for one person, you know.

Mary Rowe
Yeah. Yeah.

Veni Iozzo
So, I would actually say from our perspective, we feel very fortunate that we were that we have this new building and that we're able, that our design is flexible enough to allow us to adjust. It's not as easy for us in some of our legacy portfolio.

Toni Rossi
Mary, I know you're going to go to Sarah, but I just wanted to jump off of what Veni said, just because it was very relevant—and, and certainly almost everything that you've talked about, Veni, I can, I can actually speak to the same thing from a, you know, provincial context, and using public sector real estate, because office is office. But the one thing that I do want to jump off of what Veni said was the ability in some of our buildings, now, as we're retrofitting. Now, it's actually an amazing time to be retrofitting big and large buildings, because the learnings that we are starting to see, with respect to what COVID has taught us—and, and again, jumping off of what Veni said with respect to the remoteness, and the openness, we can now look at things like good mechanical, good, good HVAC airflow, the ability to actually utilize large spaces. Accessibility has been a critical component for us. And as we know, from an accessible perspective, having larger hallways having boardrooms with, with bigger spaces, to allow for all individuals, I think that has that has allowed us, now, as we're looking and pivoting into, into our new retrofit. So, I know you're going to Sarah, but I just wanted to jump in.

Mary Rowe
I'm going to stay with you.

Toni Rossi
Oh.

Mary Rowe
I want to stay with you. I mean, you guys are making me feel better about the investments we made. Yeah, talk to us about—because I think it's valuable that the Empire Club put private sector and public sector folks on this on this call. I know for instance in Ottawa, the City of Ottawa, 40 percent of the commercial space in Ottawa and downtown Ottawa is leased by the Government of Canada. And the implications of the Government of Canada not coming back into the offices is very, very significant for the economy of the City of Ottawa. All those small, small shops and things. There's nobody going in for lunch. So, if you're a very important, government is a very important stakeholder in this discussion. So, talk to us a little bit, Toni, about what's, what are you seeing in government-owned offices and provincial offices in the inventory, and you're just, you started to speak about how you're doing lots of retrofitting and, and that the pandemic is kind of fortuitous in that way. Tell us again about what's going on with this topic.

Toni Rossi
Yeah. I, I mean, I think what, what is very important to understand in public sector real estate, especially on the office side, it, it is very similar and follows private sector real estate. So, the models, the thoughts, what the lessons learned, I think it's critically important, and the reason it's following is because the thought leaders in real estate are the thought leaders in real estate. And so, the designers, as we're doing things, are comparable. I think the one key difference is the public sector is both one of the largest landowners or landlords of office and workplaces, as well as one of the largest tenants. And so, your comment on how we work with the commercial sector to be a tenant—and maybe I'll speak to that first.

You know, we're very, very closely connected with a lot of those landlords. And, and I would say over the years, you know—the one thing the pandemic, and not just this pandemic, because this pandemic has been the reason for, you know, we'll call this the current recession. But, but, but over time, recessions have occurred. And what occurs through recessions, and certainly, as I've seen what we've done from a public sector perspective, is we start to consolidate, optimize, mobilize, those organizations, those landlords, that are able to mobilize appropriately, and actually bring better quality of product, are the winners. You know, there's—I hate to be the crass person that says, "there will be winners and losers;" out of any one of these kinds of shifts or transformation in our economic situation right now. So, this pandemic, in this case, you know, in the real estate industry, when you think about it, we've always talked about what's the next recession, when is it, how can it work ? This pandemic, it's a, it's a health recession, but it is a recession.

So, as a tenant, we would look to those landlords—and have, over the years, as a public sector tenant—worked with the landlords that were already ahead of the game, that already had great product, that already worked on investing in their, in their portfolio, and in their product, and working with us as a tenant. I mean, again, the delivery of office knowledge workers is comparable. So, you know, Veni talks about the bank, but in government a bank would be the Ministry of Finance, we also would have, you know, a law firm would be comparable to the Attorney General, you know, MGCS is a professional services firm, so you really have in governments, in public sector, a replica of the types of tenants, the types of knowledge workers, and the types of ways that people need to produce, and the way that we have worked over the years with our landlords is really in a collaborative partnership methodology, which is now served as well through this pandemic.

So, as a tenant in Ontario, one of the largest ones, I can absolutely confirm that, you know, we've been on the phone with all of our major landlords —as I'm sure, you know, Veni's been on the phone, phone with her major landlords across, across the country, as well—talking to them. What is it that you're doing within your spaces? How is the event, you know, ventilation is the HVAC is the new four-letter word. I'm telling you I've learned more about HVAC in the last number of months than we probably have before and rightly so. So, how your buildings are performing, how you as a landlord are engaging with your tenants, those to me are going to be the way that we get out of this pandemic.

So, even though right now the office worker is able to spend more time at home—and I know you're going to talk to Sarah about why that is—five years ago, that would have been a, this would have been a very different time. And, you know, all the things that Veni talked about with respect to productivity, and we don't need to see people. You know, a different way we "don't need to see people" in the office is, really, the tools weren't there for people to actually do their work, and therefore, you needed to be there to log in.

So, the work that we're doing with our landlords, I think, is critical. The work that the landlord community is doing across this country is, is just unbelievable. And because of the way recessions work, there will be those that are quality, that actually have invested, that will continue to invest, that have worked with their tenants. Those individuals will come back. I mean, you know, we've looked over the, you know, history does repeat itself. And I hate to be trite, but this too shall pass. As we get through to a vaccine, as we, as it becomes a, not a new normal, but an evolving normal, and evolving way that people are living, we will start to see people feel more safe, and comfortable.

It's less about what I'm seeing as a, as, now as the landlord, over the years—and, you know, the public sector tends to not spend a lot of money on their real estate, especially their office portfolio. Because public sector, you know, the ability to actually use great taxpayer dollars for what it's needed; stimulate the economy for health, for people's well-being, for programs that are out to the citizens. You know, we need to also, we need to also prioritize the limited funds that are there. So, over the years, it's not a secret that a lot of public sector real estate, you know, we've been able to maintain it, it's safe, we're stewarding it very well. But it's not in the greatest condition in the same way that a pub, private sector, good landlords is, because the investment is, is measured. The investment is not in the same manner. We're not collecting rent. You know, a hospital, or a school, or a courthouse, doesn't have tenants that are going to pay you the rent that it takes.

So, as a landlord, but what we are doing is taking stock of—and I think very similar to what Veni has said—taking stock of what our buildings are, how they're performing, you know. One of the things that we spent lots and lots of time on to make it safe for individuals to feel that they can return to work, pending their own current situation. It's less about—what we have found is it's less about people feeling safe within a space. Space is personal. There's a lot of space there. It's more about people feeling safe getting to their space, and people feeling safe leaving their home for whatever reason. They've got elders in their home they've got young children that are going to school. You know, there's all kinds of other things that have now affected how individuals are finding their way back to an office application and the flexibility of that.

So as a tenant working with the landlords, I think we are right there, and, and, and using that effectively, and that will come back. As a landlord, you know, the number one thing, or one of the largest retrofits that we are doing right now is in downtown Toronto, or quasi-downtown Toronto at the McDonald Block. And it's well known, we're able to now utilize this moment in time....

Mary Rowe
Because there's no people in the way.

Toni Rossi
There's no people there.

Mary Rowe
You can just knock those walls down, Toni, and do what you want.

Toni Rossi
Well, we move them out first, Mary. The good news is, is we, they've already moved out. But there are a lot of people at the Ledge.

Mary Rowe
Yeah.

Toni Rossi
You know, our ministers are working. And if you take a look at what's occurring, you know, both in Ottawa and the federal level, I'm sure at every other province, and certainly in Ontario, you know, there is lots of people in the workplace at the legislature, in Whitney Block. They're going into the workplace. And, you know, we're making it safe from a cleaning perspective, we've learned a lot about Plexi, and installing things that are in play there, we've learned a lot about hand sanitization and making things in the office a little bit better in the here and now. I think a lot of those things may continue. You know, not to the same level.

But the area that I've really been most interested in, in the shift, is in, is in our courthouses, you know. The courthouses are a semi-office. Or very comparable to an office, you know. And the last grouping that people would think, other than bankers, the last grouping that people would think could work-from-home is a judge, or, or being able to actually deliver our justice system. And what we have found is, it's not sustainable, the delivery of justice system from home, but it has, the lessons that we've learned, is it has worked because of technology. And, you know, I know we're going to get into a bunch more discussion. But I thought maybe now might be a time—I took your spot, Sarah, I'm sorry, Mary. I got kind of, I don't know, carried away....

Mary Rowe
No, I think you said it very beautifully.

Toni Rossi
But yeah, I think technology has really been the, the equalizing factor in all ways for people to get back to work. And, and Veni talked about essential workers. Obviously, from a public sector perspective, so, you know, that that is the definition of essential worker, when you're thinking about teachers, and, and healthcare workers, and those that are front lines, and nurses, and, and police officers, and those that are going into detention centres, and the like, and, you know, lab researchers. And so, there is, the public sector tends to have a very large cohort of essential workers. But it also has a huge cohort of office workers, and how we've been—and a huge cohort of justice delivers. So, as we've learned, we're learning through, technology has really made the difference.

Mary Rowe
M'hm (affirmative). So, just before we come to you Sarah—and we're going to get to you Sarah....

Toni Rossi
Sorry, Sarah.

Mary Rowe
Toni, Toni are you, your biggest tenant?

Toni Rossi
Yeah, from, for the Government of Ontario, the, from an office perspective, the office worker, you know, the Government of Ontario, has about 15-and-a-half, 16 million square feet of office within the province. And it's almost 50/50. So, you know, we have about seven-and-a-half, eight million square feet leased from all these awesome landlords, and, and in owned. So, we are both the large, one of the....

Mary Rowe
Oh. I see. So, you're, so the province, so provincial offices are in leased spaces that somebody else owns.

Toni Rossi
Correct. About half.

Mary Rowe
And then what about, of your own inventory, do you have non-government tenants?

Toni Rossi
Very few. And the non-government tenants that we have are mostly amenities, you know, some—yeah, retail and the like. But very, very few.

Mary Rowe
Okay. And would you be the largest single commercial owner in the province, in terms of the numbers you just gave me? What, so you've got, how many how many million square feet have you got?

Toni Rossi
So, in total...

Mary Rowe
In, in office.

Toni Rossi
Provincial holdings is larger than just the portfolio that I manage...

Mary Rowe
Sure.

Toni Rossi
...so I would argue, yes. The province of Ontario is probably one of the largest landlords...

Mary Rowe
So, for instance, you would have more square footage than the government of Canada would have in the province of Ontario.

Toni Rossi
In Ontario, yeah. But obviously the government of Canada would have a huge portfolio. And, and I would say the City of Toronto is another huge portfolio in the province of Ontario.

Mary Rowe
Got it. Okay. Sarah, now's your moment. So, you know, these are two people working in highly corporate environments, public sector, private sector. And I'm interested for you to give us some comments about—you, and you have to wear two hats, here. You have to talk about a person who understands the role of tech in enabling the kinds of environments that these two have just described, but also, if you could talk a little bit about the tech sector. Because I know Communitech is about tech companies in KW, and across the province. So, we're interested in both perspectives, if you could offer those. Thanks.

Sarah McKenzie, Independent Consultant, Innovation and Future of Work
Yeah, absolutely. So, I think sort of the biggest realization for tech companies when COVID hit was, hey, we're actually pretty well prepared for this, kind of, before the pandemic hit. Lots of tech companies already were leveraging digital tools to manage all of their workflows, so tech companies have things like Jira, and Trello, and Asana, to manage the different tasks that everyone's working on and, you know, automatically pass documents back and forth, and things like that. Everyone's been using Slack to manage conversations, to the point where for most people, even if you're in the same office, like, even if you're sitting next to one another, often you would just be having a conversation over Slack, so that you're not disrupting the other person's workflow, and things that they're doing.

So, I think it was really interesting that, when everyone was forced to work-from-home, that that actually wasn't that big of a shift for people. That it was a lot of, you know, taking the same already digital processes and translating them online. And I think, especially, lots of tech companies already have remote teams that they've been working with for a while. There's one company in Kitchener-Waterloo that's actually Canada's newest unicorn company, called the ApplyBoard, and they work on providing sort of resources for international students to connect them with different education places all over the world. And so, they have teams in Kitchener, but also in India, and Egypt, and all over the place. So, I know they've talked extensively about how the transition to digital for them was just business as usual, because they're already collaborating with teams in Egypt and India, and all those types of things.

But I think where tech companies are really struggling right now—and I'm sure all organizations as well—is that when we think about remote work and what we're doing right now, we're in the middle of a pandemic. We're not just working from home, with all the implications that came with before. It's not, hey, this is, not quite a day off, but a day where I get to lounge around in my pajamas working from my office. There are real struggles and mental health implications that come with that right now. You have your kids running around in the background, or your dog that needs to be let out, or, you know, all these distractions that we never had before. So, I think a big focus for tech companies now is, how do we help our employees work-from-home effectively? Because we're not just working from home; we're being forced to work-from-home in the middle of a pandemic. And there's a significant difference there.

So, now there's lots of talk around, you know, what, how does this change the employee experience for people working, you know, both in tech companies and companies all over the world, right? There's a huge lack of that personal connection for people, right. There's a lack of that water cooler that people can go to. And I know there's lots of tech tools that are coming out, like online Zoom games, and ways of encouraging virtual coffee chats and things like that ....

Mary Rowe
Tech water cooler.

Sarah McKenzie
Exactly. Yeah, I think that's going to be one of the next big nuts to crack is, when we think about, you know, working from home more long-term, how can you continue to encourage those types of kind of impromptu collaborations that you usually have in the office?

Mary Rowe
Yeah, and, and, and there's a bit of a concern, that people have fatigue with this, and that they'll, that they miss—also there's mental health challenges, obviously, and then just the routine, they miss the routine. So, I guess it's kind of brings us to the next question, which is the, the is there a future for bricks-and-mortar. Antoinett, you want to try to chime in, here, in terms of your years of experience? Do you, you know—early on the pandemic, one of Sarah's colleagues, Toby Lütke, who's the CEO of Shopify, made a very bold statement when he announced that workers would not be coming back downtown to the Shopify offices in Ottawa. And he said, "Office centricity is dead." Now, I don't know whether he still thinks that, months later. But Antoinette, what are you seeing with your colleagues and in your practice?

Antoinette Tummillo
You know, that's a really good question. And Sarah has raised some really good points. I mean, what we're living through right now is a health crisis, and it's affecting how we do what we do, you know, where we go. This health crisis will pass. Now, the experts are saying but there'll be another one. But we're going to be smarter, and we're already smarter in terms of how we deal with the pandemic—and I gotta tell you, I'm so glad I'm in Canada living through this pandemic, having just spent a few weeks in the US. I'm thrilled to be in Canada living through this pandemic. You know, we've been through various cycles in life. And, you know, I, I, I really feel that it will have an impact to some extent

You know, I think of CIBC. I was at CIBC, when we were developing a Workplace Strategy that said yeah, let's let people work at home, let's have more open workspace. You know, Veni's taken it to another place. You know, I remember studying what the governments were doing, because, you know, what they were ahead of the curve, in terms of that thinking. And, you know, when you look at people's need, like, we're social beings. We need to interact. Like, can you imagine starting a new job ,and being onboarded on Zoom?

Mary Rowe
Well, you and I've talked about this. I have staff that I've staffed, and I've onboarded, and I've never met them. We probably all have, we've all hired people in the last little while and we've never physically met them.

Antoinette Tummillo
How does that feel? You know? I know that some companies are doing a terrific job with communicating. I mean, you know, you're seeing them on LinkedIn they're out there talking to staff via, you know, these kinds of, you know, Webex and whatever. But that's, to me, you know, an interim solution. I, I think we will go back to working in offices, I think those offices will be healthier. And as Toni was saying earlier, we were already starting to see that shift happen. You know, we had a lot of Millennials who said, "I don't want to work in the suburbs anymore." When I was at the bank, we were shifting people out to the suburbs, because we wanted to keep our rents down in the high-cost area. Well, look what CIBC is doing now they're building, you know, they're going to have a brand spanking new tower.

Toni Rossi
Well, Antoinette, it's interesting. It's interesting, your comment, there, is that it's almost going back, you know, two, three, four thousand years of la pizza, right? Like, the downtown and that, and that community, you know, going right from the minutia of your personal space within that community—but it's really about the community. And the downtowns have been there.

Mary Rowe
Can we talk about, can we talk about the piazza, for a second? Because I, I want to know whether or not people think—we're getting questions in the chat, thank you Empire Club, for sending them to me—we're getting questions in the chat about is there an opportunity to make the workplace more equitable. So, if, if you now have different, more options, and, and you don't, and you—so you think of the accommodation laws, where there is the Employment Equity Act, which is supposed to be compelling us to make our workplaces much more accommodating, and accessible, and all those things. And if we're now opening ourselves to different kinds of ways of doing that, do you imagine, then, reconfiguring office spaces? And you might have certain kind of folks that actually don't come into the downtown office, and do work remotely, and then you have others that come back and forth, maybe. And if that's the case, do we need to be investing in the piazza? Do we need to invest in different kinds of amenities downtown, and create a more kind of complete community? Veni, what do you what are you seeing in terms of going forward, you know?

Veni Iozzo
Yeah, and, exactly going forward. Well, I think remote work, as some percentage of work week, is here to stay. So, I think everybody, everybody's learned through this, and can be actually [indiscernible]....

Mary Rowe
For instance, the resistance for is this going to have an interest. We're all women, let's talk about the gender piece. Do you think that we're going to imagine a time, then, when women won't have to step out of the workforce when they have a baby. They could, in fact, be supported by their employer to be home, so they have access to their children when they need to. Do you think? I mean, that's what we're all doing now.

Veni Iozzo
So, let me, let me throw that, because, you know, we talked about COVID and the impact, and the impact on women, as well. I mean, there was a recent study from Prosperity Project and Polaris around 32 percent of women—something that Sarah just talked about—this pandemic—and Antoinette just spoke about—this pandemic is far more than just us working at home. 32 percent of women considering to quit their jobs.

Mary Rowe
You mean as a result of COVID?

Veni Iozzo
Yeah, because of every, all, their entire support system has been listed from them, right?

Mary Rowe
Right. Right.

Veni Iozzo
School systems, everything's up in the air, elder care, all of that is up in the air, right? So they're saying 32 percent are considering that. And so, what I think to that is, are we going back to the 1950's, where the women will stay home and, you know, men are going off to work? But I also say, what I also say to that, if we do this right, we finally might find that right integration between work-life-play, in a way that supports diversity, diverse needs—not only for women, but it will also, perhaps, here in Canada, we have an opportunity where that could be a key of winning the war on talent. You know, especially with women, and others with other special needs that have a lot to contribute.

Mary Rowe
Right yeah, like our—I mean, Sarah I see you nodding there. Is the tech sector engaged with this? Can we, could we be, in fact, offering different kinds of supports, so that people that might have been excluded from the workplace might all of a sudden have more of an opportunity than—Toni's nodding. Sarah, what about you, and then I'll go to Toni.

Sarah McKenzie
Yeah, absolutely. And I think even pre-pandemic I've seen, from a tech culture standpoint, companies have started being a lot, or started promoting sort of family values a lot more, and started being a lot more understanding of the parents need to leave early in order to pick their kid up from daycare, or—and then some of the understanding that, if that's the case, then they'll make up the hours in the evening, and things like that.

Mary Rowe
There is a downside to that. There is the downside—and we're all, we all can nod our heads about this—I have board members and colleagues that are emailing me at midnight, because that's when they can get to it, right ?So, that's, as you say, there's more flexibility, but then are we gonna—is it gonna pinch us on the other side?

Veni Iozzo
Well, I think that's an important point, Mary. Because what, what this has done, some people are arguing that their work-life balance has actually evaporated. I mean, I, you know, I'm not sure if you even saw recently one of the hotel chains was offering day passes for people wanting to take a break from home and come to work at these places, right? Like before we used to want to, you know, break from the office, and now it's. A break from home. But I think our relationship with office space is what is what's changing, right? It's about purpose, intent-driven intended, not just coming in by default, right? When and why you come in will look different, like, the thinking has to shift to where work is most optimally performed on-site, remote, or both.

Mary Rowe
Right. And you're going to parse the tasks accordingly. Toni you've been trying to jump in.

Toni Rossi
Yeah. Well, you know, what I, it's funny because I actually think what we're starting to talk a little bit about is a holistic person and is a holistic community. And so, and so, what COVID I think has accelerated—to your initial point, Mary—that the spark that it has done, the catalyst that it has done, it is actually ensured that people understand that holistic group. So, so Veni, I don't think we're going back to the 1950's, where, you know, the woman is at home and the man is working...

Veni Iozzo
No, we're not going to.

Toni Rossi
...however, however I actually, I actually do think that we are going back to those kinds of family values. Because what has truly occurred is some individuals, Mary, like, their biorhythms are to work at night. And that's when they'll work, right? So, what we have now started to be able to understand, using the workplace—you know, "place" is such an important place for yourself, for your own ability to be productive—but now there's, there's flexibility in where you can be productive, when you can be productive, why you need to be productive, and for whom, you know. And I think, Veni, your comment on, you know, that 32 percent of women that are, you know, thinking about quitting. I think it's because, as females, you know, we, we tend to, good bad or indifferent, females tend to take on a little bit more of that emotional labour, meaning they're the ones—even though, you know, everyone's responsible, they're the ones thinking about the lunch for the kids, and, you know, my god, I have to, you know, visit my grandmother, and at the long-term care, or whatever the case may be.

But what I'm starting to see, and I think what society is starting to see more and more—and why I do want to come back to that piazza, Mary—what I think society is seeing more and more is, as a family unit, you know, we've got flexibility now. That it's not the woman in the 1950's; it's actually the family unit, a parent, somebody, an elder, an aunt, a whomever, somebody—we need to actually start to work together to parse out, you know, who's doing those roles. Because they can all be done. And as a family unit, we're starting to see ,we need to live work and play together. And in many cases back to, you know, that downtown or the suburbs, and just the way that we have led the rural areas, those, that's the way that we've been able to do it. So, those that are, you know, perhaps not wanting, or never wanted to live in downtown Toronto, as an example, they don't have to. Live wherever they want, and work wherever they want. But many people....

Mary Rowe
Can we talk about proximity in this notion of a household? Because as we're saying, you know, all of a sudden everything is on in the Zoom frame, you know, the cat might arrive, the child may appear, the spouse may whatever. And it's sort of shocking us. But could we take it back to the actual land use implications. If, if we're going to use office space differently, does that mean, does that mean that we might be on—we're getting a question on the chat, so I'm going to see if I can just feed it in. Do you think we might imagine office buildings being repurposed within their envelope? Are we going to see more residential, more mixed buildings with residential and office, and support, so that if you did have childcare, it might be two stories down from you, and maybe there are people living five floors above you. In fact, doesn't that support the complete neighbourhood thing? And that would then mean, if you have people there 24/7, then you're going to have to have a park for them to go to. Antoinette, are you imagining that at all, kind of repurposing of some of the actual real estate in downtown core, for instance, or offices have tended to be the only use. Can you imagine that?

Antoinette Tummillo
Am I the only one on this panel that's already seen that happening?

Veni Iozzo
Yes, it is.

Antoinette Tummillo
No yeah, I live downtown. Yeah, I'm a proud downtowner, I've lived nine months of my life in a suburb. And, you know what?, I'm a hardcore downtowner, all right?. And I'm not a Torontonian. But I'm a hardcore, proud Torontonian now, because I've been living here for whatever it is, 30 years. And this city has so much to offer. Let me give you a different lens on this pandemic, and some of the things that it's done—and I know there's a lot of pressures on families. I live in a neighbourhood where there's a lot of kids. My kids are all grown up. And what I've seen is families connecting in a way they never had time to connect, because mom and dad would be leaving the house at 6:30 in the morning, come back at six, seven o'clock at night. And guess what? Then it's the drill master, do your homework, do this. Well, guess what? They've got time to do things together now. They've got time to, you know—yes, there's interruptions or whatever. But people have become, I don't know, as a community, maybe as Canadians, like, I don't mind seeing the cat screen through. I love seeing some of these kids come across the screen and say, "Hey, who's that? What's your kid's name?" It just makes it more real for all of us.

Mary Rowe
When you think that what Veni was talking about, about if you shift your oversight to then being about outcomes, is that a way to be more accommodating? Is this something that should stick, even when you could....

Veni Iozzo
You know, Mary, what this is reminding me of? I remember when digital, when even digital banking and all of that was going on, they're saying, oh, all the banking centre's going to go, and people are just all going to do everything online, and stuff like that. It's about the and. You know, this whole notion that integration between virtual and on-site, it's an and, not an or, right? And if we, if we get it right, it's gonna open up more people being able to enter whether the workforce, and, you know, in opportunities that they didn't consider in the past, stay in the workforce, in the case of some women that are trying to raise their family and the family values are important—I'm not suggesting that they shouldn't be. But I think now we can maybe find a way to actually make all of this real and have more productive Canadians as a result of that.

Toni Rossi
And Mary, your question was, would we repurpose those buildings. And my answer is, we've been repurposing those buildings forever. Yeah. And they will continue to be repurposed.

Mary Rowe
Do you think we'll see more of it? I mean, I have this anecdote in my head about what happened in lower Manhattan after 9/11. And they had only commercial uses down there. And then when they rebuilt, the City of New York rebuilt. They decided to introduce residential, and there was tremendous resistance to it, people said no one will ever go down and live there. And it's turned out to be a huge success. And do you think it's a trend that will accelerate? Is that a particle accelerator? Will we see more conversions, do you think?

Toni Rossi
I think we're going to need to. I think the innovation that has come out of what this pandemic has shown us is that back to, there will be some winners and losers on land, and on buildings, and on the use of that land. And what I'm also saying from a public sector perspective is, public sector land is there for the delivery of programs, whatever that program may be: long-term care, healthcare, education, office, you name it. And what I think we're starting to see more and more, which I'm loving, is the interconnection between what is needing to be delivered from a private sector perspective, and the usage of that land or that building for private sector, but also how it can then be used to deliver on public good, or to have public impact, and have citizen impacts. So, I do believe, you know, look, mixed-use was never a thing. If you think about the early days of landlords and putting, oh my, you know, let's put a shopping centre out in the middle of nowhere, but then a community occurred around that, that sopping centre. And, oh, by the way, it was all land use with the school, and all the rest of it. And, oh, maybe on that same huge piece of land that we have in the parking lot, we might want to make it mixed use. Let's put an office building there. Oh, well, maybe in the future, it's not just a shopping centre, it's an office building. Perhaps now we could also next door have a long-term care centre, and, and oh, what about those lands that all the schools have? They're already in an urban setting. How can they be repurposed? And, you know, we haven't even talked a little bit about the infrastructure that's needed, the transit that's needed to get us in and around there. But, you know, I think the dialogue on, "is the office dead?" That was one of your questions. Do we need bricks-and-mortar; will it ever go away? It's going to change, no question, or evolve. But, you know, from all indications, and, you know, even through this pandemic, globally, people are actually still utilizing their workplace, and the bricks-and-mortar.

Mary Rowe
I think we need new words. Sarah, give us a new word for office. Because your sector has been ahead of this. I mean, you've had people working from home for decades. And they're a certain personality type, which is now becoming more prolific, let's just say. More of us are becoming what you've been for years. But, you know, maybe office is an old-fashioned term. It sort of suggested that you only do one thing there. But what I'm hearing these folks say is that the office is a place where you do a whole lot, maybe you're going to do a whole bunch of things.

Veni Iozzo
Exactly right, Mary. You know, its place can be a powerful way to demonstrate and be a clear, visible artifact of culture.

Mary Rowe
Okay.

Veni Iozzo
Right? So, if you think of it from communities, if you think of organizations as communities—which is how we think of our own organization—it's about, it's a community, right? And then expand it to an external community as part of that. It can really be that demonstration, that clear, visible artifact. And because, in my view, this is not about getting rid of offices per se, rather redesigning the workplace, which is what you've been driving at through this question, Mary. And well-designed physical spaces can enable curated experiences that support culture and creativity, experiences focused on connection and engagement, you know, for networking, on purpose, unified by a common purpose and sense of belonging, in-person ideation, celebrations, and recognition, builds pride, energy, and loyalty.

Mary Rowe
Veni, you're making the bank sound like a really great fun place, for God's sake.

Veni Iozzo
It is! You know, Antoinette was there a long time ago, a lot of people have been there. Banks have, our bank has changed.

Mary Rowe
Banks have changed.

Antoinette Tummillo
I just want to remind everybody of something. Think about 1980-'81—Sarah, I don't know if you were around then—but 1981. What's it, think about it. Think about downtown, 1980-'81. It was all office buildings.

Mary Rowe
Yeah.

Antoinette Tummillo
When I moved into the city, I hated it, because I came from Montréal, right? Think about downtown, today. You're talking about repurpose. We have been doing it. And I think when you think about the City of Toronto, and what they're trying to do with their plan, they want that community. It's got to be business, it's got to be amenities, it's got to be theatres, it's got to be homes. It's not about people.

Mary Rowe
It's really about complete neighbourhoods and creating complete communities. So, Sarah, I'm going to give the last word to you, because....

Toni Rossi
So. Shopify was wrong. So, really, I think what you're [indiscernible]. Is the office dead? I think the office is going to morph, or that workplace is going to....

Mary Rowe
[indiscernible] So Sarah, I want to give the last word to you because I feel like we're the past, and we're going to charge you with the future. Imagine a new word for what we've been engaging in.

Sarah McKenzie
So the term that Communitech has been using for the longest time is, and actually, Communitech has a building in Kitchener where community employees work, but we also have lots of innovation labs, and startup companies, and things like that, and we refer to that as the Communitech Hub, which I absolutely love as the term. Because it's essentially a central location, where everyone can come and collaborate, and work together, and have their little home if they want to. And I just think that really encapsulates what the office should be.

Mary Rowe
And on that note, we'll pass it back to you, Antoinette, and I want to thank everybody for joining us and for the Empire Club hosting this very provocative conversation about the future of the office. Thanks, gals. And I just want to quote [indiscernible], who says, "there'll be no recovery without she covering," and hearing you folks has just reinforced to me how important women are to this discussion. So, thanks for having us, and Antoinette, I'll turn it over to you.

Note of Appreciation and Concluding Remarks by Antoinette Tummillo
Well, thank you, and I have the honour to give the appreciation remarks on behalf of Hydro One. They, unfortunately, couldn't be here today, and they're a big sponsor of ours. Ladies, this was a really great discussion. Thank you for rolling me into the discussion. I am just as passionate as you all are. You know, when I think when we thought about this panel, and I think about all of you on this panel, you really represent government, you represent the financial industry, the tech industry. These are the leaders in groups that have been pushing the momentum forward, and this discussion has demonstrated that as well. So thank you again. Thank you, Mary, for shepherding this discussion. It was quite good. And it's nice to have a panel of all women, although we've done this before. Just so you know, we do really take a lot of pride in diversity at the Empire Club, and our board, and the kinds of speakers we bring forward.

So let me tell you about our upcoming events, and we've got quite a few coming up. We've got Mark Poweska coming on November 13th. He's the President and CEO of Hydro One. Dr. Tedros from the World Health Organization, that should be a good one to tune in to. Blake Hutcheson is going to come, as well, on November 20th, and as you all know, he's the President and CEO of OMERS. We also have our signature event on December 10th, which I'm really excited about. We have a Nation Builder Award that we give out. And last year went to the Raptors, and this year, who better than the frontline workers? So, we're absolutely delighted to be awarding frontline workers, giving them the award. We've got a lineup of terrific VIPs and celebrities to come speak. That's on December 10th, so join us for those events. Just go online and you can register, and I look forward to seeing you at our next virtual event. So, thank you, everybody.