Working with Academic Leaders to Improve Space Utilization
How to inflect behavior change and improve space utilization rates
Ann Forman Lippens, Managing Director, Research
Space management has always been a critical issue for higher education institutions, but recent enrollment trends are making it much more pressing. Nationally, enrollment has grown nearly 12% between 2007 and 2013. Across the same time period, campus space grew only 6%. The resulting tightening space has restricted some institutions’ ability to execute on academic and financial priorities, such as launching new research or academic programs.
Why not just build to grow?
Today’s higher education space needs are far more complex and costly than the institutional concerns seen over the past half-century. Historically, institutions have accommodated new faculty and students with renovations or new buildings, but with revenue declines, rising operational costs, and enrollment growth that far outpaced growth in the past decade, this “build to grow” mentality has proven to be unsustainable.
Facilities leaders should work with academic leaders to redeploy underutilized campus space.
A problem of excess, not shortage
Rather than build to grow, institutions must make better use of existing space and improve overall space utilization—and the good news is that most campuses have running room. Throughout our research we found a handful of the most egregious examples of misused space—such as departments scheduling fake courses to box other units out of certain classrooms.
During our research interviews, we spoke to one institution that estimated that by redeploying just 2% of its general education space, the campus can avoid new construction for several years. At a cost of $300 per square foot, the university will save $45 million in avoided construction fees.
Establish a formalized process to triage all space requests to the most appropriate decision makers. Introduce a standardized new space request form to capture all essential information for the space committee. Tailor space communications to provide the most compelling data to distinct academic leaders.
Section 1: Improving space governance efficacy and decision-making processes
Practice 1: Tiered space request resolution
Many institutions do not have a clearly defined process for evaluating space requests. This often leads to space committees considering poorly scoped requests or requests that do not align with the committee’s purview. In some cases, unclear processes drive confused or frustrated applicants to circumvent the process altogether and make rogue space changes on their own. A clearly defined process for reviewing space requests enables institutions to quickly triage and direct incoming space requests to the appropriate recipient for further review.
Practice 2: Standardized new space request form
While most institutions employ a new space request form, the forms do not always capture the information necessary for the space committee to fully vet the request. Most forms do not require unit leaders to elaborate on the necessity of meeting a specific request. Additionally, the committee does not necessarily know whether or not a request aligns with academic priorities. By creating a standardized new space request form that requires senior leaders to sign off, institutions can more reliably gather the necessary information to rigorously evaluate space requests.
Practice 3: Facilities-to-academics-leaders space communication tools
Many Facilities leaders struggle to improve space utilization because they lack support from leadership to drive change. At some institutions, stakeholders are unaware of the negative consequences of poor space utilization for the campus community. At other institutions, stakeholders fail to see how they would benefit from the results of improved utilization and are unmotivated to act. As a result, stakeholders deprioritize space management initiatives, citing them as less pressing than other priorities or too politically fraught. By tailoring space management communications to a specific audience and highlighting solutions, Facilities leaders can better engage academic leaders in space management initiatives.
Section 2: Recalibrating allocation and size of faculty offices
Practice 4: Enforceable no-office protocols
While most institutions guarantee private offices for full-time faculty members, office assignments for other types of instructors and non-academic staff vary. Some institutions have generous space protocols granting private offices to most employees, regardless of how much time they spend on campus. Others have no protocols at all, or struggle to enforce the ones they have. As a result, part-time, emeriti, and adjunct faculty often have their own offices, and full-time faculty occasionally have multiple offices. While reclaiming private office space from tenured faculty is a nonstarter on most campuses, many institutions have successfully reclaimed space from non-tenured faculty. By eliminating private offices for non-tenured faculty, institutions can free up underutilized office space and ultimately reduce the demand for offices in new construction.
Practice 5: Voluntary office withdrawal incentive
While most institutions continue to guarantee faculty private offices, advances in technology enable faculty to work from locations across campus or from home. As a result, faculty members spend less time in their offices, but institutions continue to dedicate significant Facilities resources to constructing, operating, and maintaining offices regardless of how frequently faculty use them. By offering an incentive for faculty to voluntarily surrender their private office, institutions can begin to reduce present and future demand for office space.
Practice 6: Unit-level office utilization bonus/penalty
Institutions hope that incentives and space charges will motivate academics to better utilize or give back space. However, space charges have little impact when not directed toward a specific type of space. Incentives that specifically target a particular kind of space help academic leaders determine what actions to take to improve utilization.
Section 3: Increasing share of centrally scheduled classrooms
Practice 7: Classroom centralization incentives
While nearly every campus has at least some general purpose classrooms in a central pool, most institutions still have a significant number of instructional spaces that are controlled or claimed by specific departments. Department leaders typically restrict access to these classrooms, resulting in lower utilization rates. Even on campuses that formally expect departments to release unused classrooms for central scheduling, department leaders too often hoard space for “rainy day” use. Institutions can encourage departments to voluntarily release classrooms to a central pool using a mixture of rewards and penalties.
Practice 8: Specialized classroom recalibration
Often, colleges and universities allow departments to control a handful of classrooms with specialized technology or capabilities, assuming no other departments could or would want to use the space. As a result, many spaces that could be used by multiple departments for multiple purposes sit outside a central scheduling pool and have poor utilization rates.
Section 4: Increasing lab productivity
Practice 9: Revenue-driven lab allocation
While institutions have a handful of basic metrics they can use to inform the initial research space allocation decision, including research staff size and equipment needs, most institutions do not track how productively space is used after it is allocated to a researcher. As a result, individual researchers continue to occupy their lab regardless of changes in grant funding. They often even expand beyond their initial allocation, whether or not funding grows. By establishing a space productivity benchmark and tracking individual researchers against it, institutions can gauge how productively space is currently being used and link researcher productivity to future lab allocation decisions.
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