The Future of Work campaign is a long‑running, data‑driven thought leadership program that JLL has evolved since 2011 into a global survey of 1,000+ senior CRE and workplace decision‑makers, designed to evidence how organizations are transforming work, workplace and real estate. It is characterized by intensive collaboration between JLL’s research team, business leaders, and Meridian West, with around 30 internal stakeholders shaping the business questions, refining the survey, and co‑interpreting results into a few powerful messages. The campaign delivers robust, profiled insights (e.g., maturity models, leaders vs “on the path”) that JLL uses both to advise clients and to steer its own service development, while also generating strong external impact, including 80+ tier‑one media articles and high‑profile coverage on CNN, Yahoo Finance, the Wall Street Journal and Fortune.
The Future of Work campaign is a long‑running, data‑driven thought leadership program that JLL has evolved since 2011 into a global survey of 1,000+ senior CRE and workplace decision‑makers, designed to evidence how organizations are transforming work, workplace and real estate. It is characterized by intensive collaboration between JLL’s research team, business leaders, and Meridian West, with around 30 internal stakeholders shaping the business questions. The campaign delivers robust, profiled insights (e.g., maturity models, leaders vs “on the path”) that JLL uses both to advise clients and to steer its own service development, while also generating strong external impact, including 80+ tier‑one media articles and high‑profile coverage on CNN, Yahoo Finance, the Wall Street Journal and Fortune.
JLL's Future of Work survey isn't just a content exercise — it's a core business tool that helps clients understand market dynamics, benchmark against competitors, and anticipate future demand. The research directly supports JLL's service development and commercial conversations.
With around 15 people on the research side and another 15 in marketing and PR, managing diverse internal voices was critical. The key to making it work was ongoing engagement rather than treating the project as a one-off, so the business already trusted the research team before work began.
Meridian West's role went beyond data collection — they provided a neutral eye on the data, statistical rigour, and the discipline to push back (for example, reducing the survey from 45 questions to 20). The partnership worked because it was genuinely collaborative rather than directive.
Reaching the right respondents — CRE directors, FM leaders, workplace and sustainability decision-makers across global markets — was fundamental. The credibility of the findings depended on being able to demonstrate that the data came from genuine decision-makers at scale.
Distilling a large dataset down to five clear messages required both analytical skill and editorial judgement. The maturity profiling model (categorising organisations as "leading" vs "on the path") was a good example of turning raw findings into a framework clients could immediately apply to themselves.
The campaign generated over 80 tier-one press articles and appearances on CNN, Yahoo Finance, Wall Street Journal and Fortune. The lesson here was that media traction came from combining a highly relevant topic with robust, credible evidence — and that coverage then drove inbound client enquiries, creating a genuine snowball effect.