This year has been even more challenging – we are not just producing a double issue (on sale next week), but entirely relaunching the magazine and website, including a small but grammatically important change to our branding (the source of much debate over the years). Some of you may have noticed changes on the site already, and there is much more to come after 18 December, when our new look is revealed.
Doing this in the shadow of Covid-19, with most of the team still working remotely, has only amplified the challenge, and is a key reason why I have repeatedly said that I do not believe we have entered a new normal when it comes to the way we all work. The office matters, because for all the incredible tools the technology industry has given us it has not yet worked out how to replicate the interpersonal dynamic of a workplace, where conversations can happen quickly, confusion can be cleared up instantly, stuff like new magazine designs can be stuck to the wall, and where teamwork can feel like fun rather than function. I may have also repeatedly said that we need to be somewhat wary of the idea of buying into beaten-up value shares. But I would, in fact, be casting my beady eye over owners of office property, as Emma Powell has done – reports of its death may well have been greatly exaggerated.
The same is arguably true, then, of the businesses whose job is to get people to those offices, or bring people together in other ways. And sure enough, among the FTSE’s big movers this week we have public transport groups Stagecoach and Go-Ahead and conference business Hyve.
The latter – formerly ITE group – has unsurprisingly had a stinker of a pandemic, losing £313m this year as business travellers stayed at home and having just splashed out on some big event deals. But it reckons people will rush back to face-to-face events as soon as the world opens for business again, and I agree – product demonstrations and networking just don’t work as well online (just like the cancelled office party). Hyve has, nevertheless, been testing online events this year. And what it has learnt may eventually help it emerge from the pandemic as a stronger ‘hybrid’ business, supporting physical events with online channels to deliver scale, reach and a level of customer insight that was never imaginable before. It is a useful reminder that while Covid may not change the world beyond recognition, it may help enhance it.
