Whether it’s an office, warehouse, hospital, school or shop, workers are entitled to a happy healthy workplace.

It’s the obligation of the employer – and the building owner – to ensure their workplace is the best it can be. Today, in our flexible work environment new health and welfare standards say the responsibility can extend to the home. An employer may need to ensure their staff have good ergonomic facilities and they are safe – including physically and emotionally.

For workplace and facility managers it’s a whole new world of obligation.

But also opportunity.

Our symposium that will be held in person and online will bring some of the world’s leading experts – many of whom are in Australia – to share the insights they’re providing to Australia’s biggest employers and landlords.

8:15 - 9:00
Registration and networking

9:00 - 9:05
Acknowledgement of Country & Introduction – Tina Perinotto, Managing Editor, The Fifth Estate

9:05 - 9:25
International Keynote – A Global perspective on emerging trends and best practice
Speaker: Kay Sargent, Senior Director & Principal of Workplace, HOK Architects USA

Global trends in the changing workplace, what the leading corporates and property owners in the US are doing.

9:25 - 9:45
National Keynote – The Australian workplace story
Speaker: James Calder, Global Director, ERA-co

What does the workplace in Australia now mean for those working in a wide range of areas – offices, factories, shopping centres and hospitals.

9:45 - 10:35
Safety and wellness in the workplace – What’s that mean anyway?Moderator: Tone Wheeler, Director, Environa
Panellists: Bryon Price, Strategic Development Director, A.G. Coombs
Anthony Marklund, Partner/Sustainability Principal, Floth
Jack Noonan, Vice President APAC, International WELL Building Institute
Rhonda Brighton-Hall, Co-Founder/CEO of mwah

The panel discusses our obligations in the new normal of COVID practice. Where do our obligations end? How can rating standards help?

10:35 - 11:00
Designing for neurodiversity
Speaker: Kellie Payne, Director & Leader of Workplace Strategy, Bates Smart

Kellie is back after her hugely popular presentations at our offices events in Brisbane in 2018 and Sydney 2019 to share her latest work and thinking. Think how to encourage advertising people to work in an office, a task that even before Covid was a bit like herding cats. Then there is how to keep the super smart people working in tech and IT who have their own particular special requirements.

11:00 - 11:20
Morning Tea Break

11:20 - 12:00
Our strange/different new normal
Moderator: Tone Wheeler, Director, Environa
Panellists: Chris Alcock, Principal Consulting, Six Ideas by Dexus
Claudia Barriga-Larriviere, Organisational Design | Workplace Culture + Employer Brand, ERA-co
Christhina Candido, Assoc Professor, Director – SHE (Sustainable and Healthy Environments) Lab, University of Melbourne
Kellie Payne, Director & Leader of Workplace Strategy, Bates Smart

This panel grapples with the growing variety of needs we humans have that will affect our workplace and the organisations we work in. How can we repurpose our current space to entice workers back to the fold and meet the diversity of needs? How will the element of choice help or hinder businesses and what’s their learning curve look like? We will look at a variety of workplaces and workplace styles to examine their impact.

12:00 - 13:00
Investors and corporates – where to now and how.
And what’s to worry about?
Moderator: Robert Harley, columnist and former property editor, The Australian Financial Review
Panellists:
Zoe Baker, Sustainability Engagement Co-ordinator, CitySwitch
Andrew Borger, Head of Office Development, Charter Hall
Ludo Campbell-Reid, Director City Design and Liveability, Wyndham City
Natalie Slessor, Environmental Psychologist, Head of Customer Futures, Lendlease

We’ve heard critical analysis, creative thinking, and evidence-based research on blending human needs and physical space. So, what do the investors and corporates think? What are they likely to decide, who are they listening to and working with?

13:00
Event Wrap & Close

14:30 - 16:00
Masterclass: How to reinvent the workplace you have now (without spending a mint) and woo your staff back with more collaborative and fun spaces
Facilitator: Chris Alcock, Principal Consulting, Six Ideas by Dexus
Presenters:
Patrick Carpenter, Head of Acoustics, Cundall
Bettina Easton, Head of Light4 Australia, Cundall