Kathryn House
Hello, and welcome to Talking Property with CBRE. I'm Kathryn House, your podcast host, and in today's episode, we're doing something a little different. Rather than speaking with established industry leaders, we're focusing on two emerging voices who challenged delegates at this year's CoreNet Australia Conference to think differently about the future of work. CoreNet is a non-profit corporate real estate association representing nearly 10,000 members in 50 countries. At their annual Australia conference, their REd Talks program gives young leaders the opportunity to present bold ideas to hundreds of industry professionals through fast-paced TED style presentations, helping bring new perspectives into the corporate real estate conversation.
Marco Gritti
I think, ultimately, it doesn't matter how many tools and technology we have, people will do business with people.
Kathryn House
That's Marco Gritti, who explored what the next generation really expects from work.
Carmen Paech
I think we're not getting the best out of our people if we're just measuring by production quantities.
Kathryn House
And that's Carmen Paech, who tackled one of the biggest questions facing organisations in the age of AI, what is a human worth? I hope you enjoy our conversation. Marco, welcome to Talking Property. It's great to have you on the show.
Marco Gritti
Thank you, Kathryn. Great to be here.
Kathryn House
And Carmen, I loved your REd Talk. Thanks for joining Talking Property.
Carmen Paech
Thanks for having me. It's great to chat with you today.
Kathryn House
So for listeners who weren't at the conference, I'd love to hear a little about the REd Talks experience from you both. You only had seven minutes to present a big idea. So maybe start with you, Marco. What made you put your hand up?
Marco Gritti
Well, I think it was one of those moments where the topic aligned very well with my experience, and then internally, it sort of fit quite well where I was. We're building new teams now, so this is very front of mind on, you know, how do we attract and retain younger generations. So it was just the alignment of a lot of things, and that worked really well.
Kathryn House
And what about you, Carmen? What made you want to do the talk?
Carmen Paech
One of my colleagues actually sent it to me and suggested that I apply. So she'd done it before in a previous year, and she said it was a really great experience, and she thought I'd be really great for it. Had a read through, it sounded great, sounded like a really good opportunity, so I put my submission in.
Kathryn House
It must have been nerve wracking.
Carmen Paech
Yes. A little bit. I wasn't expecting to be chosen, to be honest. So I was pleasantly surprised, put a lot of effort into sort of what my topic was going to be, and, yeah, obviously, it resonated with the team.
Kathryn House
So how hard was it distilling a big idea into just seven minutes?
Marco Gritti
For me, I always find the shorter, the harder because you just have to remove all the fat and get to the juice, which is a good exercise. And I feel like it's an exercise that I feel like nowadays, especially with AI, you have to get better at. AI does a lot of that AI slop then adds things that don't have to be there. So I feel like having a short amount of time where you can just get your point across and do that really well, I think it's sort of, yeah, trained that muscle that perhaps was dormant for a bit. So I really, really enjoyed it.
Kathryn House
And Carmen. And did you use AI to help with your presentation?
Carmen Paech
I actually didn't, and I didn't fit mine into the seven minutes. I was a little bit over. But, yeah, I did it all myself, so I was quite deliberate with sort of breaking it down, but definitely a task to get it to fit within that time frame and say all the things that I wanted to say.
Kathryn House
Well, it was very powerful. I really enjoyed it. So, Marco, maybe we could start with you and your presentation, which was about the next generation and work. You were challenging some of the assumptions about what younger generations want from work. What do you think is the biggest misconception that leaders still have?
Marco Gritti
I think the biggest misconception is that the younger generations value above everything flexibility, which is important, but it's not the thing that retains them. They think that perhaps the purpose and the vision of the company is what attracts the younger generation, which is important, but I think, again, it's not the one that, you know, makes people stay in the longer term. I think the thing that leaders need to get better at is understanding that the one thing that attracts and retains the younger generation, probably any generations from here on, is growth in their company. So personally, a lot of people have got goals, but very few managers sit down and understand what those goals are. And as younger generations, everything is instant. We want to move quickly. We want to know that we are growing. It doesn't mean that we need to have a promotion every 12 months, but it means though is that we can see that we've got a mapped growth. We know where we're going next, and our employer is supporting there. I think the moment employers understand that the key to returning younger talent is to say, first of all, we know where you want to go and how can we help you get there and then mapping that out. I think it's a really important part of the journey of retention.
Kathryn House
And how important do you think it is for people to really understand what skills they need next?
Marco Gritti
I mean, I think it's everything. Right? The main thing as leaders, what we have to do is hopefully, you've walked the path that some of your employees are walking, and so you can leapfrog some steps. You can perhaps send them, you know, an uncharted way because you've done things that might not have worked for you. So I think knowing the next skills is a critical component of growth. But, you know, the world is changing so quickly, and so also being flexible and sort of being instead of, perhaps a specialist, you know, develop that generalist skill and sort of instead of having depth, have breadth of skills, I think that's quite important for the new generation.
Kathryn House
And so if we're thinking about success, what for the younger generation does success look like?
Marco Gritti
Oof. This is a hard question. For us, success is having the flexibility is really important. Feeling challenged, not just, you know, feeling busy, but also feeling a sense of autonomy and ownership. I think when you look at the data, a lot of younger generations have got side hustles, are involved into startups. And when I started to think about why that is, it's probably because we want to feel that ownership mentality instead of an employee mentality. And we want to be part of something bigger than ourselves, as cliched as it sounds, I think it's very true for our generation. So I think success is really sort of feeling like there's ownership in the work that you do. You're recognised in that, but you also are given the breath to explore, to fail, experiment, all of that within sort of an environment where failing is encouraged and not punished.
Kathryn House
And so you mentioned startups, and one thing that would be good to explore is, you know, startup lessons for large organisations, I guess, because you've helped build startups yourself. What do they get right do you think that large organisations often really struggle with?
Marco Gritti
I mean, startups is such an interesting universe. Right? Because the beautiful thing about startups is that there is no queue. If you know how to do the job, you probably are already doing the job whether you're technically at that point or not. And that's because the company needs that skill set right now. Whereas with larger organisations, there is a hierarchy that inherently happens when you have large teams. And I think that the main thing is sort of how do you translate the spirit of startups, giving the younger generations the ability to get there by themselves by learning and doing that work as opposed to sitting on the sidelines and letting perhaps their leaders take the success or have the learning because it's all about, you know, cutting your teeth. It's all about learning, doing the thing as opposed to sort of planning to do the thing and then someone else gets to do it.
Kathryn House
So in listening to your talk, some of the things that really featured heavily were this whole idea of autonomy, competence, and belonging. How do you think that large organisations can create that real sense of ownership and connection?
Marco Gritti
I think it ultimately comes down to the teams within the organisation. I think the organisation needs to understand that there are a lot of islands as part of the archipelago that is the company, and what you need to do is you need to create channels within those islands to communicate, to share those skills. And ultimately, when you do that, it empowers the employees to sort of leave their silo and, you know, go out and explore other parts of the organisation. And I think one thing that a larger organisation can offer that startups don't is that breadth is because you have such a diverse skill set, you can learn from so many different professionals and different professions that you can get exposed to that quite quickly. But I feel like a lot of the larger organisations sort of see themselves as those not connected islands as opposed to sort of that that larger ecosystem where I think it could be very beneficial for people to be able to move and build that autonomy and that that competency within the larger organisation. Because when you do that, then staying at the current organisation doesn't stay that safe option. And, you know, we're staying here because we can provide money, but it does become the obvious option because you have map growth, you've got competency, you're getting upskilled by your leaders and other teams. And so then it becomes a pleasure to be part of that large organisation.
Kathryn House
I love that idea of connected islands. I'm going to use that moving forward. So if we take a broader CRE angle, when we talk about attracting and retaining talent, what role does the workplace itself play, do you think?
Marco Gritti
I think it plays an important role. You know? I don't think it plays the most critical role. I think the culture, the connection with employees is the critical part. That being said, the workplace, I think what it does is it can be a glue to bring things together and hold teams together. It's perhaps, as I said, yeah, not the main component of it, but I think it's a critical component of bringing that team together, of making sure the ideas flow with one another. But, again, I think a workplace should really just reflect the team that it's serving, whether it's hybrid, remote. You know, a workplace in 2026, it looks so different than what it did ten years ago. And probably ten years ago, ten years in the future is going to be even more different. Right? And so for me, for us, as we expand, you know, our teams is one of the constant things that we can nurture now within our younger generations that, regardless where they are, they feel a sense of belonging and autonomy and all the things that we've discussed today.
Kathryn House
So just before I go on to Carmen, bigger question maybe, but if you were advising a CEO today on one thing they should change to better engage young talent, what would it be?
Marco Gritti
I probably would say sit down with the younger generation and just ask the question. Ask them where they want to go, who they want to be, and how the organisation can help them get there. I think, as humans, we want to be heard and we want to feel appreciated. So I think if a leader does that, eighty percent of the work is done, and then it's about co-creating that path with the employee and the CEO and the leader themselves. That will create ownership on both hands, and that likely will lead to a successful relationship between the employee and the employer.
Kathryn House
So, Carmen, your talk asked a deceptively simple question, which is, what is a human worth? What made you want to tackle that topic?
Carmen Paech
Yeah. I think it's a bit of a multi-part answer, to be honest. There's been so many discussions around the value and future potential of AI, and I think those are incredibly important conversations. But as a person who designs spaces for people, I'm really interested in the human aspect and our personal experiences in the workplace. I also see so much wasted potential in people because they're just too busy to do their job well. Imagine if we could free up that time and, you know, away from the mundane tasks that AI is hopefully going to take over so that they had that space to think and push and grow themselves in new ways. And the work is so much richer for our human experience. And I think that that's really the key. We spend so much of our time at work and with our colleagues. So it's also the experience that should really matter. Are we learning? Do we have purpose? And is our work actually adding value to our lives as well? Are we providing that value back? So a bit of a multi-part piece.
Kathryn House
Absolutely. AI is something I've really struggled with because my background is writing, and I really resisted using AI because I'm like, that's what I do. And why am I getting AI to do it for me? But I've been gradually learning to, I guess, hand over those mundane parts of my job to get AI to help so I can use more of my strategic brain. But I guess a question on that AI paradox, as AI becomes more capable, why do you believe that human qualities are going to become more important or not less?
Carmen Paech
People are always going to be needed to be accountable and make those decisions for AI, but we're also the ones that are asking the questions of it. We currently define and shape what the output from it will be, and it's our creativity that drives it. AI is a tool. It's not creative. It can't make judgments and it can't do that critical thinking for us. So it's a tool for us to utilise and to help us do things more easily. So we should be able to use it to free up that time, to give us time back to do the things that we want to be actually doing. As you said, writing, doing all the things that you're actually good at and passionate about, and freeing up some of that space. I also think the world is hopefully moving in a more positive general direction, and this includes being more inclusive, more open and creating change, but AI can't do that itself. We have to do it and we have to decide what it looks like. And I think AI has been trained off all of our past bias and belief as well. So it holds those biases too. So it needs us to do that critical thinking part, do the change work ourselves, and I think that's really, really key and really important. I think that connection points really important too. So our connections with our colleagues, our connections with our clients, all of those parts that make it really rich to be at work are so important, I think, in that process as well.
Kathryn House
So you talked about creativity, and, obviously, you know, you are creative both at work and outside of work. You're a dancer and you drew on those experiences as well to form your talk. Can you explain the analogy between memorable performances and memorable workplaces?
Carmen Paech
Yeah. I think for me, they're both about the connection that you get between people and how you feel in a space. So as a workplace designer, obviously the people experience and the people that are in the space are the key, but I think that the atmosphere of the space is really important in itself and how we interact with others within it. So as a dancer, I see that as a two way experience as well between me and the audience, I'm giving something to them, I'm crafting the atmosphere for them. And at the end of the day, it's usually our connection with someone that we remember, not their ability to fill out a spreadsheet really well because the skills don't matter if they can't connect to us personally. So it's being open to connections with each other and placing importance on that part of it. And in dance, I do that really deliberately through my movements, through my timing, through my face. And when I'm designing a workplace, I'm also quite deliberate about what I'm doing in that space as well and where people can come and connect and how they might work together and how I'm crafting that.
Kathryn House
As part of your talk, you also challenge the idea that productivity alone should define success. How do you think organisations should think about value differently?
Carmen Paech
I think we're not getting the best out of our people if we're just measuring by production quantities. You can do a heap of work and it can be terrible work, or you can spend time on doing something and have a really good outcome. Ideally, you find a balance there where it's a nice mix of productivity and innovation because you do eventually need to produce something and you can't always be innovating and it doesn't need to always be something new. Sometimes the known thing is the better way to go. So it's finding that balance of the parts where you do need to push yourself and the parts where, you know, actually we just need to get this thing out and that's okay. People are also more productive when they're supported and feel a sense of well-being and connection. And I think that that was talked about quite a lot at the conference as well. So it's more that the initial focus shouldn't be on the productivity. It should be on supporting people to be their best. And I think if we ask our clients about why they enjoy working with us, it's, you know, it is the work that we create and being competent at our jobs, but it's also that relationship piece that becomes the really key part of it. It's those soft skills that go into creating connections with others, you know, building trust, finding solutions to problems that the clients didn't know that they had yet. Because you can have the best technical skills and be fast at your job. But as I said before, if people don't like working with you or you can't build those relationships, it doesn't matter.
Kathryn House
Yeah. The relationship piece is just so important. You also spoke about creating room to fail, and that's, I think, a really interesting piece, but also to learn and create. What do you think that looks like in practice?
Carmen Paech
I think it's a hard one. I think Marco touched on this as well, but I think it comes down to leadership and the culture of an organisation and it needs to be safe and allow for that failure. I was teaching a dance class the other week and we talked a lot in the class about being ugly when we're doing our freestyling in dance. And it's so scary. There are mirrors everywhere. You're worried everyone is looking at you. They're worried that I'm judging them as I'm teaching them. But I was like, you know what? It's not meant to be nice. It's not meant to be clean at this point. You're creating and you're finding new things. So, you know, I'm messy and I'm ugly all the time when I'm freestyling, but we have to practice and make mess before you can produce those perfect clean shapes. So we had this giant big chat about it, and they've actually been so much freer in their movements since. And that has translated into them being much more technically better when we're working on our choreography and things like that. And I think it's the same at work. In the design world, our work is very iterative, so we do actually practice failure quite a lot, but there is an ongoing pressure to be constantly producing and to be valuable through that. But if our organisations could make it safer and make it an integral part of our work days to be able to fail and create and try something new, I think we'd be so much better off as a whole. And I do think this often works better in a less hierarchical structure as well. It's the idea that everyone's ideas are just as valuable regardless of their level, and everyone has something different to give to a conversation.
Kathryn House
I love that idea of embracing the messiness and also that point about hierarchical structures. I think that's one of the things I like most about my role is it's a very flat hierarchical structure, and I think that does bring out the best in people.
Carmen Paech
Yeah. And I think it just allows people to throw ideas out there and, you know, I think it's important even for leaders to say the dumb thing sometimes and the people that are down below are like, oh, you know, it's actually okay if I say something silly. You know, we're all contributing.
Kathryn House
Yes. And so taking that CRE angle and you're a workplace designer, how do you think workplaces should evolve if the most valuable human skills are creativity, empathy and connection?
Carmen Paech
Yeah. I think our workplaces need to have spaces that are ultimately created with human needs in mind. And at the base of it, this looks like having truly inclusive design, designing for disability and for neurodiversity so people don't have to struggle just to be present at work. Within this there's a need for different types of spaces. So for intimate spaces that can feel safer and comforting for different types of work, but also for those larger spaces for group collaboration. It's also designing in those smaller moments of connection too. So those incidental encounters where two people, maybe they both need a coffee and they end up in the break room at the same time, or they stopped on the stairs for a quick chat because they had to cross over at a certain time in their day. So I guess ultimately just good human centred design with purposeful atmosphere and thinking about the type of work that needs to be done. So everyone's organisation is going to be slightly different to what that looks like, But at the face of it as well, that technology is in the background, so whether that's AI or it's just your really good working teams calls sitting in the background seamlessly. So it's just supporting you and helping to facilitate you to do better work.
Kathryn House
Yeah. I love the idea of stairs. So it's one of the things about my workplace I enjoy the most after we redid it is that, you know, I have this three sets of stairs, and I just have some of my best conversations on the stairs.
Carmen Paech
Yep. It's those side chats that are so important.
Kathryn House
Yes. So, one final question before I bring Marco back in, but, your talk was about AI. What do you think is one uniquely human capability that AI is unlikely to replace?
Carmen Paech
I think this is really hard to narrow down to just one.
Kathryn House
Yes.
Carmen Paech
But I'm going to put two in there, maybe. But I think it's just got to be our imagination and our ability to connect with other people. That's the part that makes it worthwhile, that connection piece.
Kathryn House
Yes. So, Marco, bringing you back in, I think what was interesting that your conference talks came from really different starting points, but they seem to arrive at a similar conclusion. So, whether we're talking about AI or attracting future talent, that organisations need to think more deeply about the human experience of work. So, question for you, Marco. Do you think today's workplaces are still optimised for efficiency when they should be optimised for growth and innovation?
Marco Gritti
I think some workplaces do it and others don't do it as well. I think the workplaces that will win are the ones totally, like Carmen said, that understand that the best work comes from the connection. And I think we are realising, especially the younger generation, this need and want of, in real life, situations. They want to be perhaps in the office a little bit more. They want to be exposed to those conversations, those coffee chats, those side chats on the stairs because so much of the growth of a younger person just happens through those conversations. So, I think the workplaces that will win in the future are those that understand that, you know, create a connection and then, yeah, performance will come, but that will just be an outcome of what you've created earlier on, which is that that connection piece.
Kathryn House
And maybe taking a really forward look, Carmen, if you imagine the workplace of 2035, what do you think people will value most?
Carmen Paech
Again, I think that one's a difficult one to narrow down to just one thing.
Kathryn House
Yes. You can you can have two or three.
Carmen Paech
I think though we're still just going to want to be able to learn and grow and feel valuable. So, you know, I think that was the heart of Marco's talk as well. And with technology continuing to help us take some of our workload, I think being able to retain a sense of purpose and pride in our work is really important and to keep that sense of learning and growing in our positions.
Kathryn House
And, Marco, how does corporate real estate need to evolve, do you think, to support those expectations?
Marco Gritti
Well, I think this sector and any sector, I think what they need to understand is that ultimately, you know, how do you create spaces where there is, yeah, a real sense of connection that happens with with employees and other parts of the organisation. And doing so, I think, will lead to workplaces that are able to retain that talent in the longer term.
Kathryn House
And so we're thinking about that. What do you think there's one thing that leaders are doing that they should stop doing to help support this?
Marco Gritti
I think perhaps something that leaders should do less is probably, you know, think of their team as silos, as not part of a larger organisation. We see it mostly when we've got sort of the, the Christmas parties, the realisation that we, as an organisation, have got so many more people that you often don't see them. They sort of come out of their spaces. And so I think it's just about this sort of stuff. You really start doing more of that connection with cross functional teams, bring those different skill sets and those different generations together. They can learn from each other.
Kathryn House
Carmen, we've talked about stopping. On a more positive note, what do you think they should be starting to do more of?
Carmen Paech
Yeah. Just trying to get the best out of the team. They, in effect, in their top leadership role, they're the facilitator of the workplace. So I'd love to see a bit more support for curiosity and learning and encouragement from all different parts of the organisation through their role. So I think as well as AI comes in and maybe take some of their more data driven parts of their job. Hopefully, they'll have a bit more time for that human element and really getting the best out of the team.
Kathryn House
Have you got a start suggestion, Marco?
Marco Gritti
I mean, I think, yeah, what they should start doing is is start listening. I think, you know, we have two ears and one mouth. Use the same ratio. Listen more, talk less, go around the organisation, and really understand what what people care, what what they want more. And, yeah, like Carmen said, it's just about living from a place of certainty and more of that place of curiosity.
Kathryn House
So a final reflection. Marco, what's a belief about work that you held five years ago that you've since changed your mind about?
Marco Gritti
Oof, my belief five years ago was that larger teams were fundamentally better at creating culture, at creating better work, ultimately creating more value for the company. And that is absolutely wrong right now. I have changed that opinion strongly. I think smaller teams that understand and are deeply connected with one another understand the purpose of why they exist in the larger organisation. And each of those people see how they can contribute, will far outrun any team that's sort of large because I think they're ultimately driven by a better cause than those larger teams. So yeah, I think that the main change has been team size.
Kathryn House
Carmen, is there anything that you've changed your mind about?
Carmen Paech
Yeah, I think it goes back to the last point. When I was younger, I assumed that leadership had all the answers and that they knew what they were doing, But the reality is that nobody knows, you know, you can have experience and you can have knowledge, but we're all learning and changing and growing. And everyone in the organisation has that value to add. And, you know, the leaders sometimes don't know. They try to find out. So I think, yes. Just recognising that everyone has that value.
Kathryn House
And to close this out, and this is one sentence, so another difficult one, but, Carmen, what gives you the most optimism about the future of work?
Carmen Paech
I think there's a lot of conversations and bodies of research happening on our importance in the workplace. So I'm optimistic that that will only increase hopefully, and I think so many of the conversations at the conference were around that as well. So I'm excited to see where the next wave of workers take us.
Kathryn House
And, Marco, what gives you the most optimism?
Marco Gritti
I think, ultimately, it doesn't matter how many tools and technology we have. People will do business with people. And as long as we remember that, doesn't matter what the workplace will look like, I think we will be able to continue to create value and connect with one another and never forget that, you know, it's always about relationships, whether they happen virtually, whether they happen in person, and also any person conversation and coffee. But if they have to happen virtually, then, you know, I come with that for that as well.
Kathryn House
Well, thank you so much, Marco, for joining Talking Property. It was great to have you on the show.
Marco Gritti
Thank you, Kathryn. Loved being here.
Kathryn House
And Carmen, thank you so much for joining. Both of your talks were probably the highlight of my CoreNet experience.
Carmen Paech
Thanks, Kathryn. It's great to be involved.
Kathryn House
Marco and Carmen, your presentations reminded us that while technology will continue to reshape how work gets done, the future may be less about replacing human potential and more about understanding how to unlock it. I'd also like to acknowledge the incredible work that went into the conference. CBRE was proud to support the event as a sponsor, and our own Ceilidh Higgins played a significant role in helping bring the conference together. It's also fantastic to see young leaders from across the industry, including CBRE's Maddy Grisdale in her role with the CoreNet Australia Young Leaders Committee, helping create opportunities for the next generation of talent. To our listeners, I hope you enjoy this episode, and we'd love it if you could rate or review Talking Property to help other people find us. Until next time.
