The Virtual Office: is this the new normal?
A Virtual Office was once considered a niche, and now businesses all across the Netherlands (and the world) are making use of the possibility to have their business address in a prestigious location without the costs and difficulties of physically renting the space. What’s changed?
COVID-19 and the shift to telework in the Netherlands
Well, for starters, the Covid-19 pandemic shifted the way that we organize our office spaces, maybe forever. Covid-19 shook up the traditional idea of an office space: the brick-and-mortar office, with employees making long commutes to sit at their desks sending emails and performing tasks using software they have access to at home.
Since gathering face to face became a health hazard, companies have had to adapt and be flexible. Workers all across the globe ended up teleworking from home. The initial rush was hectic: companies were forced to shift all face-to-face meetings to virtual office spaces, like Zoom, Slack, and Teams, while workers struggled to balance home-life and the stress of the pandemic.
Surprising stats on remote work have offices rethinking their model
At some point everyone got the hang of it, and now, 54% of workers say that they would prefer to continue working from home, if given the choice. While some struggled to focus alongside their other obligations at home, many came to enjoy the increased flexibility they were awarded by remote work.
Worker preference for more flexibility is only one factor that has led 82% of companies to say they plan to keep using a hybrid model of work going forward – that is, allowing employees to work remotely for some of the time. What maybe came as a surprise to companies is that remote work does not reduce productivity, and even increases productivity in some cases.
If the same quality of work can be accomplished just as productively in a remote virtual office space, then the justification for going back to the old model of physical office spaces seems to fall apart. It’s more expensive to have a physical office space for people to use. Rent, commuting costs, furniture, equipment, cleaning, reception, etc., all add up. And for the extra costs, it seems to provide little benefit.
Of course, a company cannot do with no office at all – they need an address for registration with the chamber of commerce, a business address for correspondence with clients, a mailing address, and the space to sometimes do some work and hold meetings with team members and clients.
The Virtual Office: A solution for companies
This is precisely where a Virtual Office comes in. With a Virtual Office from Amsterdam Coworking, a company can have a virtual address in the Netherlands without renting a physical office. A Netherlands-based company can still make use of flex-desks or the meeting room for when face-to-face collaboration with employees and clients just cannot be avoided.
The rest of the time, money will be saved on renting an office space while employees work from wherever they are. Whether that’s at home or on a sun-splashed terrace of a local cafe, we are not here to judge!
In fact, you don’t even have to be located in Holland to rent a Virtual Office from Amsterdam Coworking – you will have the value of a registered business address in Amsterdam, even if you live and work in Berlin, New York, or somewhere warm and tropical (if that’s you, we will try our best to contain our jealousy!)
The future for your company
Maybe your company is already part of the world-wide shift towards hybrid/remote work, and you’re tired of paying the high costs for a mostly-empty physical office in the Netherlands. Maybe your company is just getting started and you want to keep startup costs on office-rental low. Maybe your business doesn’t even have employees and so an office space just isn’t necessary. Regardless of which category you fall into, your company could benefit from shifting to a Virtual Office. We can’t say for certain if this will be the “new normal” in a post-pandemic world, but we do know that the benefits of a Virtual Office are hard to deny.
Get in touch with us if you’re interested in a Virtual Office at Amsterdam Coworking!
