"We've been in business globally for two years and we're stilllooking at several issues, [including] where to put our team andour changing portfolio," Deidre Buzzetto, director of global realestate at Lenovo, said. She added that because the company, whichhas its executive headquarters in Morrisville, NC, is "extremelymobile," in the future it will probably need less space than it hasnow. Buzzetto's comments came at CoreNet Global NYC discussionpanel on the new work force and the changing realities of theworkplace.

"We look at our portfolio and still see too much space. Most ofour workers are going from 6 a.m. to midnight and they can do thatanywhere," she explained. "Our largest space is 600,000 sf inRaleigh. The rest of our space in the US is small centers. We arestarting to take a look at one-year leases so we an assess where toput people. People don't even use their office phones anymore."

As Lenovo acknowledges it will need less space down the road,some companies are trying to break old habits and come to gripswith that reality. Lawrence Bates, director of global strategy andplanning for American Express, explained that his firm's "biggestimmediate problem" is business units forecasting a need for morespace as American Express is trying to expand its mobility/virtualprogram. And American Express, as well as every other company, mayhave no choice but to expand its mobility as more and moreemployees telecommute. "One of our recent surveys found that on aweekly average our offices are less than 35% occupied," said PeterMiscovich, partner, workplace transformation at Deloitte ConsultingLLP.