Amazon’s search for a second headquarters location has fired imaginations around the USA.
What will it take, local leaders ask, to win this prize? But beyond this immediate concern, there are lasting lessons for everyone.
The Harvard Business Review boiled down the key points of the tech titan’s request for proposal (RFP), noting:
- “The importance of talent pervades … with special mention of a ‘strong’ university system.”
- “Promoting an inclusive culture matters.”
- The company’s wish list “reads like an urban planner’s dream, brimming with calls for energy efficient buildings, recycling services, public plazas, green space … “
“The thing is, all of this directly matters right now, today, not just to economic developers, but to everyone reading this,” says Adam Sichol of Longfellow Real Estate Partners. “It matters to the business leader striving to grow a company and to prospective employees weighing options and looking to land at a company bound for success.”
Longfellow is developing workplaces like Amazon’s in mixed-use campuses and cutting-edge offices around the country. From emerging hubs like Philadelphia’s Schuylkill Yards, a partnership with Brandywine Realty Trust and Drexel University, to the Durham Innovation District (aka Durham.ID), the 15-acre life science and technology center closely aligned with Duke University and situated in the heart of the Bull City.
Talent, according to Sichol, is the essential idea with these projects. Companies live and die by attracting and retaining the best and brightest. And, talent, in turn, is drawn to environments that are bustling and inspiring, relaxing and nurturing, welcoming and inclusive.
“Take Durham.ID as an example,” says Longfellow’s Jessica Brock. “What happens in between and around our office buildings there is as important as what goes on inside. So, our master plan includes business and community amenities like restaurants and retail as well as parks and greenways — with the entire district seamlessly connected to downtown and surrounding neighbourhoods.”
In Research Triangle Park, Longfellow is reinventing properties like Imperial Center and Keystone Technology Park to include amenities designed to stimulate creative thinking and encourage collaboration. This includes cafes, flex gyms complete with yoga sessions, bike sharing, running clubs, game rooms and more.
At Imperial Center, a 75,000-square-foot courtyard brims with lush grass, an outdoor grill and yard games to create an atmosphere where talent can get “out of the box” and into productive and imaginative work conversations.
Because every organisation is different in its needs, Longfellow also employs technologies to enhance the overall experience for interior spaces. At Durham.ID’s two new LEED Silver office buildings, for example, Longfellow will install View Dynamic Glass, a window product that intuitively tints to provide a cutting-edge office environment with abundant natural light, temperature control, and unobstructed views without the need for traditional window shades.
All of this is intended to help companies compete for top talent and achieve new heights of success. “Just as Amazon is looking for certain specific things to elevate their second headquarters,” says Brock, “the people and companies in our spaces also seek to be a cut above. We help them get there.”
