How Marriott Vacations Worldwide’s new HQ in O-Town West emphasizes flexibility, wellness
When executives for Marriott Vacations Worldwide Corp. (NYSE: VAC) talk about their newly completed headquarters and the theme of flexibility that pervades it, they’re referring to more than just its floor plan or design.
Plans for the nine-story, 350,000-square-foot office property predate the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic — or the supply-chain-driven construction delays that were omnipresent throughout the industry in its wake.
Because of this, the company’s leadership has had to be flexible each step of the way during the project’s buildout and in deciding how its employees would engage and utilize the new space.
The company is the anchor tenant of Orlando-based Unicorp National Developments Inc.’s $1 billion-plus O-Town West mixed-use project.
The building’s exterior construction was completed by Apopka-based Finfrock, while Redwood City, California-based DPR Construction did the interior buildout. JLL has worked with Marriott Vacations Worldwide throughout as project manager for the new headquarters.
A phased move-in to the building began in November and stretched through the beginning of the year. Now, the Orlando-based, publicly traded company is ramping up its efforts to show off the new facility with an open house for employee family and friends scheduled for Jan. 31.
Mike Yonker, an executive vice president for Marriott Vacations Worldwide and the company’s chief human resources officer, told Orlando Business Journal feedback from the company’s associates has been overwhelmingly positive.
In addition to their appreciation of the building’s many amenities, he said the implementation of the company’s new adaptive work model has been well-received as a way to fit the needs of a staff with varying degrees of remote work.
The policy emphasizes flexibility, giving employees the option to have a full-time desk space that is their own or to “hotel” — working in one of the many workspaces that does not have an assigned employee. Yonker said how often employees are required to be in the office is largely delegated to team leaders, giving each position and its relation to remote work a greater level of customization.
“This adaptive work model, I’m just so thankful for it because it really has allowed us to position ourselves to be attractive — it helps us both from a retention standpoint and from an attraction standpoint,” Yonker said.
An additional degree of flexibility is built in for employees in giving them optionality for how they work when in the office.
In addition to the traditional cubicle-style workstations, each floor has spaces that are more casual for employees to work from, including big and small lounge areas. This is in addition to small quiet rooms for individual team members to take calls within, myriad conference room options and other smaller spaces designed to encourage more impromptu collaboration.
Katherine Stang, Marriott Vacations Worldwide’s Director for Global Program and Process Management, said that the building has been designed to regularly support 1,500 Central Florida-based employees.
Included among these are 1,200 more regular users of the headquarters space and around 300 call center employees who are largely remote, but who can count on space to work in the office in situations where they may not have internet at home, for example.
“They’re remote teams, but the building supports them,” Stang said.
In addition to traditional workspaces to accommodate all 1,200 employees expected to regularly work out of the facility, there are enough informal spaces there for all employees to have at least two places to work on any given day.
On top of that, the building utilizes “structured vacancy” such that it can accommodate large volumes of employees visiting from other locations, as the company has more than 21,000 employees in total.
“Not only can associates choose on how they want to sit and do their work when they’re here, but we can also load up the building on days where we bring people in from the resorts and support twice as many occupants as what it gets on a daily basis,” Stang said.
Other amenities in the new headquarters include:
- an emphasis on natural light that manifests itself with floor-to-ceiling windows and the decision to move the majority executive offices to the interior of the building, to allow for all employees to have access to ample natural light
- traditional workstations that include desks employees can sit or stand at, as well as dual monitors and ergonomic furniture
- a large on-site fitness center available to all employees, including a full range of exercise equipment, in addition to the ongoing rollout of classes that can be attended
- a health-conscious design that includes stairs strategically placed in the center of the building to encourage higher usage, as well as plants located throughout
- rooms on each floor designed for mothers or general wellness needs, such as a place to perform an insulin shot or prayer
- an “IT bar” for employees to have technology issues addressed
- custom spaces on respective floors include a small media studio and a test kitchen.
Stang indicated the headquarters was designed in accordance with LEED and Fitwel certifications for the building and that both of those designations are being sought.
Meanwhile, with the delivery of Marriott Vacations Worldwide’s headquarters in the last quarter of 2023, a CBRE office real estate report notes there is currently no office space under construction in the Orlando market.
Though the final quarter of the year saw positive absorption of 164,217 square feet of office space in the market, vacancy remains high at 15.7% across the region. The average asking rent for the Orlando office market is $26.95 per square foot, up 3.1% year-over-year, the report notes.