Business Actual Property Leaders Examine New York’s Workplace Panorama With Cornell College students

For the first time in its history, Cornell University’s Baker Program in Real Estate brings students to Cornell’s Tech Campus located in New York City, the epicenter of the real estate industry, for discussions on the evolution of the workplace with top commercial real estate leaders.

The graduate course, entitled “Conversations with Thought Leaders in Real Estate,” began on February 3 and is taught by Vocon’s Tom Vecchione, one of the nation’s top commercial real estate planning experts. Graduate students in Cornell’s Real Estate and City & Regional
Planning programs traveled to New York City for the class, which will function as a salon to
explore ideas related to the workplace.

“New York City contains some 450 million square feet of office space and is home to one of the world’s most diverse economies, from arts and finance to technology and life sciences,” said Vecchione, a principal at Vocon, a leading national architecture, workplace design and strategy firm. “This is the ideal laboratory to explore the evolving role of commercial real estate.”

Vecchione shares his more than 30 years of real estate expertise as he conducts bi-weekly
lectures at the Cornell Tech Campus in New York City. He will be joined by a host of industry
leaders from Vornado Realty Trust, the Center for an Urban Future, Microsoft, Rockefeller
Group, SL Green Realty Corporation, Savills North America, Trinity Church Wall Street and
NYC Economic Development Corporation.

“We have witnessed a monumental shift in the role of the office, and this course will examine how evolving workplace standards affect individual buildings, but also business districts and the city as a whole,” Vecchione said. “Businesses are experimenting and course-correcting to create an office environment that engages employees while prompting innovation, collaboration and productivity.”

Vocon, which has offices in New York City and Cleveland, is currently working with landlords
and tenants in New York and nationally to create thoughtful spaces that meet the needs of tenants in flux. The lessons learned by Vocon and guest lecturers will inform conversations
about the relationship between work and the city. The course will center discussions around
issues such as infrastructure, livability, growth and community through the end of March.