Translated from 日本語 • View original 
In January 2024, we co-hosted a webinar titled "The key to promoting work styles lies in tackling meeting room issues!
In this webinar, we introduced how to deal with the newly emerging conference issues in the post-corona era, with the services of each company.
Among them, I would like to introduce some of the contents introduced by Colorkrew, "How to improve the efficiency of conference room management and solve the shortage of conference rooms?"
Background to the Increasing Challenges in Meeting Rooms
Before the coronavirus pandemic in March 2020, fixed seating and face-to-face customer meetings were the norm. However, after the coronavirus epidemic, we were forced to work remotely, and online MTG using Zoom and other platforms became mainstream. As a result of the significant drop in attendance, more and more companies are downsizing their offices or moving to smaller offices.
However, since May 2023, the number of attendance rates and visitors has increased sharply due to the shift to Category 5 due to Corona. Now that hybrid work has become the norm, the issues in the office are changing together, and the way of "work style reform" required is gradually changing.
In addition to the lack of conference rooms, there are many hybrid conference formats that combine real and online, and new issues that were not present in real meetings are becoming apparent.
For example, in addition to the increase in office attendance and visitors, the demand for quiet spaces has increased due to the increase in online MTG, and the use of meeting rooms has increased.
Many of you may be feeling new challenges related to these conference rooms.
How to Eliminate the Shortage of Seating and Meeting Rooms
What is the situation where there is not enough seats and meeting rooms?
There are many cases where people from within the company say that the meeting room is not available, so they don't know the details, but they feel that it is somehow insufficient.
There are two main things you need to do in this case:
1.「 Understanding the right space demand"... Find out if the demand usage scenario is really necessary
2.「 Adjusting and grasping the amount of space supply" ... Consider and understand whether the supply can be increased
By implementing these measures, you can understand the details of demand and increase supply. Furthermore, by utilizing systems such as Colorkrew Biz, an environment where supply and demand can be measured is ideal.
Understanding the Right Space Needs
There are various ways to implement the first "understanding the appropriate space demand", but here are three of them.
1. Determine the Priority Rules for Meeting Room Usage
It is very important to set rules for meeting room use. By prioritizing meeting room usage and sharing it within the company, you can reduce the use of low-priority meeting rooms.
The meeting room usage priority rules in the image below are similar to the rules of Colorkrew, and are the slides actually introduced in this webinar.
For example, when using a meeting room, the highest priority is "real MTG with customers" and "real MTG within the company for handling sensitive information", and the lowest is online MTG for one person. Because of the need for a quiet space, there are many cases where employees use the meeting room, which makes it impossible to use the high-priority MTG.
If you don't have a priority rule for meeting room usage yet, please consider it.
2. Prevent Empty Meeting Rooms
"Empty conference room reservations", such as meeting rooms being reserved but not actually used, have been a problem for a long time. According to some data, before the corona epidemic, about 25% of conference room reservations were empty. However, there seems to be data that the percentage has jumped to 30% since Corona moved to Category 5. This is thought to be due to the negative spiral of wanting to suppress the lack of conference rooms in advance, and the increase in empty reservations for conference rooms.
To address this issue, the "automatic cancellation function" that utilizes the system is effective. This is a function that automatically cancels and releases the meeting room reservation if the meeting room is not checked in after a certain amount of time has passed. Colorkrew Biz has this feature and is used by many customers.
3. Put a scalpel in the sanctuary
Employees are not the only ones who use company space. Lockers and cabinets are also in high demand for space. However, in general, these spaces are "sanctuaries" and are stereotyped as absolutely necessary.
However, this "sanctuary" is surprisingly often a "demand that is not necessarily necessary". When we surveyed employees about the use of lockers and cabinets at Colorkrew, we found that most of them were "materials that will never be looked back on" and "storage of personal items", and that junk was carefully stored in the "sanctuary".
Based on this situation, we were able to significantly reduce the size of the lockers, reduce the number of cabinets, and instead install a total of nine "phone booths" in the company that can be used for online MTG. Please consider putting a scalpel in this "sanctuary" in your company.
Adjusting and Understanding Space Supply
After understanding such appropriate space demand, it is necessary to create space while reviewing the facility, and reinvent the created space into a space that meets the company's demand.
In addition, if you can use the system to visualize the usage status of space and accurately grasp the amount of demand and supply, it will be useful for further improving internal space.
Colorkrew Biz can manage spaces such as meeting rooms and seats. It is also very useful for booking functions, automatic cancellation of meeting rooms, and analysis of usage. We have many useful features to make effective use of your company's space, so if you are worried about the issue of lack of space, please contact us.
We hope that this blog will be of some help to you in making effective use of your company's space.