WSTB

Atrium Health releases first look at Wake Forest School of Medicine in Charlotte:

https://www.charlotteobserver.com/news/ ... 86562.html

A healthcare version of Silicon Valley, stretching from Winston-Salem to Charlotte? I wish local news sources would research what Winston-Salem will gain from this and how big the local economic impact will be. Soon, the Innovation Quarter won't have anything under construction and it still has a large grass lot as the most visible thing you see driving into downtown.

https://businessnc.com/atrium-envisions ... -research/

Ever the optimist, F&M and I do often share your optimism, but sadly not in this case. This will be Wake Forest School of Medicine Charlotte with a smaller satellite in W-S (if we’re lucky). And good luck on Wake Forest retaining position one as reflected in that rendering - Atrium will be first. Even if by some miracle WFU Med School retains the empty headquarters in W-S the national media will always use Charlotte in references. Recall, some years back that the Today Show announced during Krispy Kreme’s heyday their secret was locked in a safe at their headquarters in ATLANTA. Let’s see, on the national scene is Charlotte or W-S more well-known and more apt to be quoted regardless of the reality.

I'm trying to figure this out, using the information provided. Something is being acquired to require federal approval? It also required Wake Forest board approval in January, which was kept quiet. It has to be something very complicated? Both hospitals must remain independent and the medical school remains in Winston-Salem? I'm guessing it would be very difficult for Atrium to gain approval to acquire the entire WFBH system? Are they creating a 50/50 ownership of the Wake Forest Baptist health Hawthorne Hill Campus and the Carolinas Medical Center Midtown Campus, with the investments in Winston-Salem by Atrium and the second campus in Charlotte by Wake Forest in exchange for each side selling half ownership (most likely)? Or... is Wake Forest University acquiring partial 49-50% ownership of the Midtown Charlotte Campus, so they can create a medical school there and the investments in Winston-Salem are to talk Wake Forest into entering this complicated deal? Keeping the hospital systems independent leaves Wake Forest acquiring something and I don't think they would acquire all of Atrium's flagship medical center. Maybe a partial ownership to transform it into a Wake Forest Baptist Health University Medical Center? If that is the acquisition, then Wake Forest gained a great deal from having something Atrium and Charlotte wanted. Both scenarios would use partial ownership to possibly encourage Wake Forest to invest more in medical education in Charlotte, instead of just creating a secondary after-thought branch.

So, the medical research would likely happen in downtown Winston-Salem, according to what we've previously heard, and patients at both the Midtown Charlotte Campus and Hawthorne Hill would gain the benefits from the science/research? It does seem as if they are building an equal-sized innovation district in Charlotte? It would have roughly the same number of high-paying jobs and roughly the same economic impact as the southern half of the Innovation Quarter? I'm concerned this will be our bad surprise from this deal. Thankfully, the neighborhood in Charlotte is fighting to reduce the size of this project and will likely fight expansion efforts. I want to say they will create their own innovation district centered around their strengths, but that doesn't have Winston-Salem as the center of research and has me concerned Charlotte may take all of the outside companies? Maybe the population health and tech transfer center Atrium is building in Winston-Salem will be the headquarters and center of the combined innovation districts, as they work with the university in Winston-Salem (most likely), and would give the appearance that downtown Winston-Salem is the research hub? That could make Winston-Salem the preferred location to work with the university and hospitals, though? However, the Innovation Quarter is largely a failure at attracting outside companies and Wake Forest should terminate the contract with whoever is in charge of attracting outside jobs to the iQ. Replace it with something that provides incentives for reaching goals and go with a major national company with a proven record at attracting jobs to developments like this. Maybe the Charlotte campus is a technology transfer campus, to transfer research in Winston-Salem to the hospitals in Atrium's system? But... isn't that what is planned for the building Atrium is planning in downtown Winston-Salem, on the parking lot across from Bailey Park? A second innovation district matches more with Charlotte's description of this project. The advanced technology in their classrooms is likely for classes taught in Winston-Salem and sent to Charlotte? Wake Forest has said their plan was to make Winston-Salem a significant medical research center with this deal, so I'm guessing Wake Forest's expensive investments in the Innovation Quarter will remain and it appears as if Atrium will invest heavily in the Innovation Quarter? Their benefit could be equal access to this research at their flagship, giving Charlotte the benefits of a world class university medical center, even if the university is outside their metro? It also gives Wake Forest scale, which they currently lack and the lack of scale at Wake Forest hurts Winston-Salem's efforts to become a leading research/tech center. I can't help but think Greensboro missed-out on a great opportunity. If they would've sold to Wake Forest and Wake Forest could've expanded there, the Triad would gain all of the benefits of becoming a major medical research center. Instead, Winston-Salem is sharing with Charlotte, sending possibly half or more of the benefits out of the Triad. However, Charlotte's name is likely more valuable to attracting jobs and investment for Winston-Salem. Companies in research and tech will look at Charlotte, but not give the Triad the time-of-day. Maybe that city name value is what the Innovation Quarter needs to grow, but the question we all want to know is... What do we have to give-up to gain that name connection and will those companies look here or only look at space there? The university may see this as something they have to do, if they want to attract and work with outside companies? It's all positive for them, even if the southern campus grows more. That (outside companies wanting to move to the south campus only) is where the risk of a large percentage of the medical school and research moving south would come from. If only Winston-Salem could merge its metro into Charlotte's CSA and market itself as metro Charlotte. Maybe I'm becoming too concerned? Anyone have their tickets for the Notre Dame / Wake Forest game in Winston-Salem Charlotte? It's just what area hotels and restaurants need right now... oh, it's not here. Yeah, I see them sending things that could benefit Winston-Salem more in their direction. I'm often concerned by silence. If something is good, you want to brag about it. If it's bad you want to keep it quiet. Atrium is bragging and Wake Forest is keeping it quiet.

WFU will capitalize on the Charlotte name and reputation at W-S’s expense - hey, it,s just business.



2:1 student/faculty ratio - well what can one say?

20,000 (ay carumba) high-paying jobs and $2.5 billion impact NOT in W-S. What’s the comparable impact for W-S. Can WFU make those figures available.

One student may have seven different classes / seven professors. It's more like 14:1, which I think is their average at the Reynolda Campus? Since part of being a university medical center is having professors working in the hospital, I don't think the second campus will take much from the Winston-Salem campus, since those are Wake Forest Baptist Health doctors.

Right now, the Innovation Quarter hasn't attracted any outside tenants (tenants without an existing presence in Winston-Salem) that I'm aware of? This deal will give the Innovation Quarter its first outside tenant and that outside tenant will construct one building in the Innovation Quarter and pay half for another building in the Innovation Quarter, which can be leveraged to bring another apartments-wrapped-around-a-parking-deck project and there was some talk of a hotel (It will be interesting to see if it's still in their plans, with COVID-19 hitting the hospitality industry hard). On one side, I could see the need for a hotel if there is travel between the Atrium/Carolinas Medical Center and the Innovation Quarter, but on the other, existing hotels aren't too far away and could fill that need. Any hotel likely wouldn't open until 2023, when a vaccine should be available, but even before COVID-19 I was concerned about over-building hotels. Back to the outside tenant, the Innovation Quarter wouldn't have any of that without this deal. We can't say for sure what the future will hold, but it's likely the Innovation Quarter would become stagnant without the Atrium deal. This deal has potential to complete the area around Bailey Park and maybe complete the northern side of Research Parkway through the big downtown grass lots. It may even attract a developer like Front Street to return to the iQ and build something on the southern side of Research Parkway and fill more of the grass space. So, downtown Winston-Salem will gain from this. The big question is, if the new innovation district is a massive success, will Wake Forest assets leave the Innovation Quarter in 10-20 years? If so, at least the old buildings are now renovated, the streets are improved, and much of that area could be built-out by then. That is the difficult part in turning-around a downtown and neighborhoods in downtown. The already renovated buildings and new buildings can be more easily repurposed. The one thing this city has needed for years is someone to do that and it has happened and is still happening.

I've long wanted to see Winston-Salem try to bring state government offices to available space in downtown. Last year, we could see how Winston-Salem could do this. Local Democrats in the state legislature could trade their votes for relocating a sizable state office to downtown Winston-Salem. They need to be sure it's a sure thing and not paying to research the idea. Transforming the former BB&T Financial Center into a state government office through this trade of votes for jobs could be a good idea for this building's reuse. Yes, Winston-Salem does have a way to bring good-paying jobs to downtown, if local state-level politicians are willing to work together and maybe vote for something bad for the state to gain something good for the city. I think Republicans would likely be open to deals like this to fill One West Fourth and maybe bring something tech-related to the Innovation Quarter, too. I'm posting this from memory, so I'm not sure if I'm remembering all of the details correctly, but I seem to remember they offered a 2,000 job office and money for the Stevens Center. I would seek jobs. The UNC System will eventually find the money for the Stevens Center. A 2,000 job office would make that one of the city's largest employers and could fill the former BB&T Financial Center. The local Republicans and Democrats in the state legislature should meet together and make the "State Government Center at 200 West Second Street" happen.

Lowe's is subleasing 125,000 sq feet of its Uptown office space as it continues to allow it's workforce to work-from-home.

In my opinion, the cat is out of the bag, folks. Corporate America isn't going to be able to unwind WFH for it's highly talented individuals. If a company does require returning to the office five days a week, they will lose talent to organizations that do not. Charlotte will be fine, but I would short commercial real estate and businesses that depend on the office worker for the foreseeable future.

I'm hearing work-from-home is already negatively impacting innovation/collaboration. There seems to be a lot of talk of having the option to work-from-home maybe two days each week, with employees using the office three days each week. You're not seeing the great ideas, formed from being near other businesses and institutions and also from density. Employees from different parts of the business aren't meeting each other and having the discussions that lead to new ideas. Businesses aren't inside the talent pools like downtown or even Innovation Districts, where they are in the middle of college students. If it becomes an employer market, due to the recession, employers may have more power to pressure workers to return to the office. Where I work, I've already seen co-workers who miss the business travel and the office. Giving employees two days to work-from-home, each week, is seen as a happy middle ground. As someone from church once told me, we are social and not intended to be alone. There is a need to be around others. For those of us with kids, we would prefer to return to an office. There are times when I can't hear myself think or have to stop in the middle and try to restart, due to the yelling on the other side of the house or me running to see what was broken or happened or what my wife Lauren wants. I think kids like to make loud sounds when they hear people talking. There are also the cartoons and songs in the background (designed to be ear-worms) while trying to work. I do think the changes we've seen favor downtown or more interesting office districts over the typical suburban office parks. Places where density and location make it easier for companies to reach diversity goals and places that are activated by density to become 17-hour places you want to be and want to meet-up with others at, instead of 7-hour places dependent on cars that you quickly leave. These 17-hour places become the gathering points to exchange ideas and meet people outside the company that could bring the next big idea. Even within the buildings, there are or can be gathering points that create the collisions that lead to the next big idea. We are likely to see employers increase the average space per employee and not just for gathering points / amenities, but for health. A building that may have had 2,000 workers to visit downtown restaurants and rent/buy downtown residential units may now have 1,250-1,500? I do think some lower-skill back-office and call center jobs may try to go 90-100% work-from-home. If your job doesn't have much collaboration/innovation, you can easily do that anywhere, including home. Moving call centers and some back office work to home could be bad news for lower-end office space and more suburban-style office parks. Taking a guess at the future, based on what I'm seeing: Maybe we will see a downtown headquarters at an easy-to-find and prestigious address, innovation/collaborative work in possibly other downtown buildings or innovation districts or a trendy neighborhood (with the option to work-from-home for possibly two days each week?), and less collaborative back office and call center work will move to work-from-home. As we recover in two or three years, this could make the most popular areas of our cities even more expensive and it could lead to people not using the work-from-home time as much as expected, likely depending on the quality of location and buildings, leading to companies adjusting this? I guess we shall see.

My team has been more efficient working from home, although we are in an analytics role and not a creative/collaborative role. You're correct that there are roles that do require more collaboration and don't benefit from 100% WFH.

I do think the hybrid role where you WFH 2-3 days per week and go to the office 2-3 days per week will be the most common for corporate jobs. Even that will allow many companies to reduce commercial real estate by 50%. My fortune 500 company is already reducing real estate and will implement flex space.

I read an interesting article from the CEO of Reddit, who envisions that the office will be somewhere you go to to meet f2f with your team, have coffee and collaborate. Your home office will be where you actually do most of the work.

I also believe the other change agent that will further encourage WFH is climate change. The daily commute to the office has such a negative impact on the environment.

My employer already did this around 2017, if I remember correctly? Instead of leasing more space in another building, they made the windows the common area (everyone has access to the windows, which are our gathering areas), used low-wall cubicles to allow light to travel through the space and to allow for communication with those around you, added unassigned desks, built different meeting spaces with as much glass as possible, and told everyone not to use the office unless you have to. In the average week, it often results in 33/33/33. Roughly a third of the week in the office, a third meeting clients away from the office, and a third at home. I will admit that I enjoy this. 100% at home may work for some, but for others... not so much. I think Noah is watching cartoons/sleeping and Lauren is in another room. ...No, Noah is up and Lauren is running. It was quiet for a short time.

I'm a creative. Usually, this (between Thanksgiving and New Years Day) would be our slow time of the year, but this year is different. It's not really busy, but interestingly we are making instructional videos for several companies on returning to the office and we have made videos on how to do different work-related things at home, for employers to send to their employees. They are increasingly wanting to bring workers back into the office. They say they need them there. From what I've learned, only 37% of jobs can be done from home.

And there is yelling in the other room... I'm about to walk-out on this post. Thankfully, I'm not working today.

And I'm back. I was working hard earlier in the year, to keep my team working and help our office stay open. I was doing things that weren't my job and moving above other people, trying to secure work for my team. The work we do is often one of the first things businesses want to cut in times like these. I'm sure productivity was high for many, due to fears of not just losing a job, but the employer closing their doors permanently.

And Lauren yells...

And I'm back and forgot what I was planning to post next. This is an interesting look at what it is like for those working-from-home with kids.

And now I remember what I wanted to post the other day, but forgot. It really shows the downside of work-from-home for those with one or more kids.

One of the things COVID-19 did was pressure companies to make big changes they may have delayed and part of these changes have reduced office space needs and modernized many of those businesses. These are changes, some that would be seen as unpopular to make pre-COVID-19, that needed to happen for those businesses and COVID-19 accelerated these changes by years! And not just reduced office space through work-from-home, but also through eliminating departments or greater use of technology (other than work-from-home related tech). I was listening to Georgia Public Broadcasting early this morning and they discussed a book on something I spoke of earlier on how we are social and not intended to be alone. Part of the discussion on GPB was on us having others in our dreams and thinking about others, even when we are alone. The person being interviewed said, 6-8 months after COVID-19 changed everything, the one thing people say they miss the most are hugs. It was an interesting discussion. I'm sure the book is also interesting. As I thought of this, I couldn't help but think: Will a majority of people begin to change their minds on work-from-home and push to return to the office? I think it's great to have the option to work-from-home occasionally, but how many people will want to work-from-home 100% of the time after our cities and lives begin a return to what it was like in 2019? I'm sure some will, but will a majority change their minds and want to return? To be around others and return to city settings. It will be interesting to see what happens.

And a door slams in the other room... For those who want to know: The yelling the other day was over something on the walls that had to be clean-up. To employers, yes you are paying parents to clean-up messes like this during the work day. They don't wait until 5 to clean it up.