Property decisions also impact the overall performance of the government’s property portfolio. Co-locations can be an effective way to meet both a group of agencies’ or a sector’s collective goals, as well as the government’s property portfolio needs.
Co-locations provide an opportunity for you to:
- be located with other agencies, functions or sector partners you need to collaborate with
- provide common customers with a more integrated way to access government services
- recruit employees in areas where your agency may not have a physical presence
- provide more attractive and higher quality work environments to your employees. This is particularly helpful for smaller agencies who can’t normally justify providing a wide range of workspaces or amenities
- have another agency use surplus space in an existing tenancy.
When coupled with the workplace design guidelines and standards, co-locations also benefit the government’s property portfolio goals. This means:
- achieving flexibility and adaptability by:
- using common ICT and security infrastructure
- consolidating accommodation facilities
- using common furniture solutions.
- achieving value for money and effectiveness by:
- leveraging the scale of government to negotiate a better workplace outcome, not necessarily just lower rents or better commercial terms
- centralising property related procurement costs - by using All-of-Government contracts and through a centralised process
- minimising the number of buildings government agencies occupy
- minimising duplication of major facilities - like reception areas and public facing meeting rooms - and ICT infrastructure
- enabling agencies with less resource capability to leverage off more capable agencies, for ICT, property and security resources, for example
- using government purchasing panels.
- raising workplace quality and safety by:
- enabling smaller agencies to provide higher quality environments to their employees
- enabling a more consistent approach to security based on the building complex
- adopting common health, safety and security practices for buildings
- exposing agencies with less mature security and health and safety practices to agencies with higher capability.
