ACT public servants fighting for space at new office buildings

As well, the offices have been designed to accommodate only 80 per cent of its workforce at any one time even without restrictions, meaning most employees are forced to work from home at present.

The ACT government is paying a contractor more than $720,000 to create a "wayfinding system" to enable workers to book a desk or meeting room and to help locate colleagues in the offices.

ACT public servants have recently moved into a specialty-built office at the $300 million Constitution Place development by Capital Property Group in Civic.

Public servants have been in Doma's Dickson office, part of a $160 million development, since mid last year.

Both offices were built on "activity based working" principles, which stipulate that since people perform different activities in their day-to-day work they require a variety of work settings.

An ACT government spokeswoman said this was why the offices were designed to only cater for 80 per cent of the workforce.

"The new ACT government office buildings in Civic and Dickson are designed in accordance with principles of activity based working, accommodating staff at a ratio of eight workstations per 10 employees," she said.

Melbourne-based company Serraview is being paid to deliver the program over a three-year period. The company says it develops "a simple and intuitive enterprise platform for managing and optimising corporate real estate".

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The ACT government spokeswoman said the system would help employees to work effectively across the offices.

"Due to the large scale of the Dickson and Civic office buildings, the system is required to support employees locating available spaces in a productive and efficient manner," she said.

"For example there are more than 80 meeting spaces in 480 Northbourne Avenue [Dickson] and more than 100 at 220 London Circuit [Civic].

"A dedicated wayfinding solution will help staff to quickly identify, locate and book these meeting rooms, as well as finding available desks and locating colleagues."

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