Introduction
Courtney Fain, Vice President of Workplace Planning and Strategy at JLL, joins Jack Ossa on The Power of Design Podcast. She works with commercial real estate brokers and their clients to decide how much space a company needs and how that space should support the way people work.
The conversation follows her path from an interior design degree to occupancy planning, workplace strategy and a move into commercial real estate, and then widens to how people think about work, offices and timesheets.
About the Episode
Courtney was born in Charlotte, moved often as a child and studied interior design at the University of Georgia. Her first job was at a furniture dealership, laying out workstations in CAD, and she says a long call about a credenza cutout showed her that detailed design work was not for her. She then joined a national architecture and design consulting firm, where she learned occupancy planning for a bank campus built for 5,000 people with 6,000 assigned, and eventually led a national workplace strategy studio of about ten people.
She explains the difference between strategy and occupancy planning, and how she joined JLL a year and a half before this conversation in a new role that supports the brokerage group. In a typical engagement she studies a client's growth plans, surveys employees and looks at how flexible work will really be used, so the company can decide on the right amount of space before searching for it.
With Jack she discusses why a quiet, polished office can still feel wrong, why activity-based workplaces work, how Covid made people question the office and the call center, and what timesheets do to people's sense of worth. They end on the future of the office: it will change but not disappear.
Key Takeaways
- Strategy comes before square feet: decide how people will work, then work out the space, instead of guessing from headcount.
- Ask the people: surveys, focus groups and visioning sessions bring out what a client may not see because they live in the space.
- Do not use one ratio for everyone: design groups that collaborate may need more days in the office than accounting or HR teams.
- Plan around activities: focus, collaboration and social time are better starting points than furniture types.
- Openness matters more than size: clients that want to question how they work get the most from workplace strategy.
- Say why: companies calling employees back should explain why the office is needed and for whom.
- The office is changing: Courtney expects a more intentional office whose purpose is defined, not its disappearance.
Highlights from the Conversation
Workplace strategy is essentially how the people are going to work.
Courtney Fain
I don't ever think that the office will fully disappear. I just think that the purpose of the office has changed.
Courtney Fain
I think that the why, in defining that why, is going to then drive the whole rest of the conversation.
Courtney Fain
Topics Discussed
- From interior design school to workplace consulting
- Occupancy planning compared with workplace strategy
- How JLL brokers and strategists work together
- Surveys, focus groups and growth planning
- Activity-based workplaces and open offices
- Remote work, call centers and Covid
- Timesheets, productivity and work-life balance
- The future of the office
Why This Conversation Matters
Anyone planning a new office or a renovation benefits from asking Courtney's first question: how will our people work? That thinking feeds directly into interior architecture, whether the project is a corporate office like the BWM Office or an adaptive reuse such as Hedgemore Flex. For companies moving into a new space, a clear brand and strategy help the architecture carry that purpose through.
About the Guest
Courtney Fain is Vice President of Workplace Planning and Strategy at JLL in Charlotte, where she supports the brokerage group and its clients. She studied interior design at the University of Georgia and spent eight years at a national architecture and design consulting firm, where she led a workplace strategy studio before moving to JLL.
