PHILADELPHIA – February 1, 2023 — Award-winning architecture, design, and strategy firm NELSON Worldwide is excited to announce the advancement of Courtney Reid to Design Leader, Retail. In her new role, Courtney will oversee and manage projects for the Food and Beverage team while collaborating with the entire Retail practice.

“Courtney is an attentive leader who motivates her team and pushes them to grow,” says Chairman and Chief Executive Officer at NELSON Worldwide, John “Ozzie” Nelson Jr. “Her ability to focus on intricate project details allows her team to make high-end design concepts a reality, and her collaborative attitude and consistent support continually elevates our practice.”

Courtney is a patient teacher and teammate who is passionate about efficiency and hard work. As Design Leader, Retail, she will promote design strategy and innovation reflective of the studio’s goals and overall mission. Courtney’s involvement and quality control over all project phases will bridge the gap between the creative and project management teams, while her leadership and clear guidance will increase professional development and overall team performance.

“I look forward to expanding our Food and Beverage team so that we can become more collaborative within the Retail practice and serve as an expert source within Food and Beverage,” notes Courtney. “As I advance in my role at NELSON, I look forward to pushing my skill sets and growing the team.”

After earning her bachelor’s degree in Architecture from Philadelphia University, Courtney began her architecture journey as a Project Designer, later elevating to Project Architect at Solutions Architecture Corp, PZS Architects, and Daroff Design. With over 13 years in the industry, Courtney’s background has paved the way for her new position as Design Leader, Retail at NELSON Worldwide. She has experience across all project phases, from design conception to construction and contract management. Her creative approach has allowed her to provide innovative solutions to design problems and develop aesthetically pleasing projects. Major upcoming projects for Courtney and her team include dining facilities within the United Airways terminal at Newark Airport, as well as the development of new restaurants in conjunction with LaGuardia Airport’s new F Concourse.

###

About NELSON Worldwide

NELSON Worldwide is an award-winning firm, boldly transforming all dimensions of the human experience through architecture, interior design, graphic design, and brand strategy. With more than 700 teammates across 20 offices, the firm’s collective network provides strategic and creative solutions that positively impact where people work, serve, play, and thrive. The team combines industry knowledge, service expertise, and geographic reach to deliver projects across the country and around the world. Client partnerships across the NELSON network include Hilton, Macy’s, Comcast, Simon Property Group, Prologis, Yum! Brands, Boston Consulting Group, T-Mobile, Emory Healthcare, SAP Fieldglass, Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield, Kroger, Hyatt, Bayer, Target, and many more.

New York, New York – December 15, 2022 — Award-winning architecture, design, and strategy firm NELSON Worldwide is excited to announce the addition of Joseph Muscarella as Vice President of Client Development. Joseph will foster growth for the firm’s retail practice, defining market opportunities through industry trend monitoring and growth opportunity assessment. He will also serve as a partner to NELSON’s workplace and hospitality practices.

“Joseph’s extensive expertise in the world of retail design and real estate development, combined with his unique perspective on brand innovation, customer experience, and new product development, will help evolve NELSON’s client services in 2023, and beyond,” notes chairman and Chief Executive Officer at NELSON Worldwide John “Ozzie” Nelson Jr. “His diverse skill set and dedication to projects enhance his creative approach to driving sustainable growth for NELSON’s retail practice.”

Passionate about turning ideas into action, Joseph identifies unique opportunities and develops strategic partnerships between business units. As an ideator with a knack for finding connections between seemingly disparate phenomena, Joseph brings his distinctive skills to new business development by offering services and solutions to clients before they even realize they need them.

“I am excited to collaborate with NELSON’s diverse team of professionals to expose potential opportunities for the retail practice through new and existing client relationships,” remarks Joseph. “Retail is poised for evolution in 2023. I strongly believe in the built environment’s ability to solve complex problems at the intersection of people, brands, and culture and look forward to uncovering what is next for retail and the consumer experience with clients.”

Joseph is a self-proclaimed “creative Swiss army knife” and “opportunity identifier”, with a soft spot for solving operational challenges. Over the last 15 years, Joseph’s creative leadership has won multiple retail design awards for concept stores around the world. He has helped scale over 5.4 million square feet of flexible workplace interior environments for Fortune 500 companies and has developed a line of flexible workplace furniture. In addition to his architectural and interior design work, Joseph has led brand strategy, creative direction, and innovation projects for brands such as PepsiCo, Starbucks, Knotel, Industrious, and other VC-backed startups.

###

About NELSON Worldwide

NELSON Worldwide is an award-winning firm, boldly transforming all dimensions of the human experience through architecture, interior design, graphic design, and brand strategy. With more than 700 teammates across 20 offices, the firm’s collective network provides strategic and creative solutions that positively impact where people work, serve, play, and thrive. The team combines industry knowledge, service expertise, and geographic reach to deliver projects across the country and around the world. Client partnerships across the NELSON network include Hilton, Macy’s, Comcast, Simon Property Group, Prologis, Yum! Brands, Boston Consulting Group, T-Mobile, Emory Healthcare, SAP Fieldglass, Unibail-Rodamco-Westfield, Kroger, Hyatt, Bayer, Target, and many more.

May 6, 2024 — NELSON Worldwide welcomes Rebecca Muchow, AIA, CID, LFA, LEED AP, as Account Leader/Senior Project Manager, Mixed-Use. Skilled at navigating complex project design conundrums, Muchow will contribute to NELSON’s market growth in the Minneapolis area and sustainability efforts within the firm and their enterprise partner, Windward Engineering.

Muchow boasts 20+ years of architectural practice, combining client service with simple, elegant, and environmentally responsible design. Muchow’s dedication to sustainability, combined with her diverse project experience across various knowledge markets, positions her to further NELSON’s commitment to fostering a future where sustainable practices seamlessly integrate with innovative design solutions. Bringing authenticity, collaboration, and a strategic design mindset to her role, Muchow’s values align seamlessly with NELSON’s diverse and innovative cross-section of work, talent, and leadership.

Muchow notes leading the sustainability and certification effort for the first ever LEED and LEED Platinum project in North Dakota, and for project architecture for the new North Dakota Governor’s Mansion as a highlight in her career. She received her Bachelor of Architecture and Bachelor of Science in Environmental Design from North Dakota State University.

As the global pandemic forces retail and restaurant brands to radically adapt, pivot and innovate, this is an opportune moment for the two industries to learn from each other. Our design and strategy teams recently joined forces to weigh in on the TOP 10 experiential strategies from each industry—identifying who does what best.

NELSON Worldwide has conducted a comprehensive evaluation of COVID-19’s impact across industries to arm our clients and partners with short- and long-term solutions to best respond, adapt, and innovate in the wake of COVID-19.

This Assessment identifies macro trends and implications that will drive shifts in business models, brand development, and the design of built environments — and ultimately, shape the human experience.

NELSON Worldwide conducted a comprehensive evaluation of COVID-19’s impact across industries to arm our clients and partners with short- and long-term solutions to best respond, adapt, and innovate.

This Impact Assessment identifies macro trends and implications that will drive shifts in business models, brand development, and the design of built environments—and ultimately, shape the human experience for higher education environments.

NELSON Worldwide conducted a comprehensive evaluation of COVID-19’s impact across industries to arm our clients and partners with short- and long-term solutions to best respond, adapt, and innovate.

This Impact Assessment identifies macro trends and implications that will drive shifts in business models, brand development, and the design of built environments—and ultimately, shape the human experience for retail centers and mixed-use environments.

The COVID-19 pandemic has ushered in a new urgency to quickly set up and adapt both public and private space for temporary testing facilities (TTFs). To help our clients, communities, and nation minimize ongoing pandemic impacts, we have developed a set of best practices and insights to safely and efficiently establish a TTF.

Advancements in technology have been improving workplace productivity for years, allowing us to work virtually from anywhere. Now that a global pandemic is forcing us to work from home, the question being posed seems to be, why return to the office at all? According our “Evolving Workforce Expectations” study, only 7% of employees want to return to work a full five days a week. If employees are a company’s most valuable asset, employers must make the workplace a sought-after destination for everyone, one that people are excited to return to.

Brands will need to reevaluate their office portfolio and determine a plan to ensure their employees can take advantage of new technologies that make communicating, collaborating, and connecting, more seamless than ever before.

But while technology continues to rapidly evolve to better bridge the gap between physical and virtual workers, the most critical element for successful adoption and activation of these tools will be a robust change management strategy. Employers must provide holistic awareness, training, and buy-in to effectively activate these new, digitally focused offerings.

Here are the four ways technology can be used to make the workplace a sought-after destination:

Instant communication

Brands are having to communicate with their employees more than ever before, and because so many things are constantly evolving, the need for immediate communication is imperative.

Integrated workplace management systems like iOffice and their employee experience app Hummingbird, previously considered luxuries, will be necessities. With technology like this, employees can reserve workstations or conference rooms, submit service requests, be alerted to incoming mail, visitors, and more, all from their own mobile devices. Employers can also keep a close eye on who is in and out of their facility each day, constantly monitoring capacity to keep their employees safe.

As wearable technology gains more popularity, many employers are realizing these tools offer a unique opportunity to communicate with employees. With the traditional, in-office nine to five likely becoming extinct, a singular means of communication like email won’t be enough. And with employees working from a variety of environments including coffee shops, home offices, hotel lounges, and even their cars, wearable technology is something they’ll always have access to.

As the mobile workforce and risks of cyber security attacks continue to increase, innovative solutions like Samsung Knox are changing the way companies use wearables, embedding their software within workers’ mobile devices and smartwatches to secure company data, and help mitigate breaches of private company information.

Real-time collaboration

Collaboration tools will only gain more popularity during and after the pandemic. From video conferencing, to file sharing, there are numerous tools that will make the hybrid work day more seamless. It is no longer just about meeting virtually anymore, it is about going a step further to integrate with multiple platforms, support blended teams, provide robust collaboration opportunities, and the ability to accommodate smaller, breakout groups virtually.

Even before the pandemic tech giants like Microsoft were perfecting their cloud-based collaboration tools, but the social distancing, work-from-home mandates are accelerating this trend. These brands have taken a close look at how consumers have had to change their behaviors drastically in a short period of time and made improvements to their tools to make the digital experience as close as possible to the real-time experience.

Today, digital meeting facilitators can set up automated emails connected to their meetings, making it easier to manage attendance. They can also view a dashboard after to get a big picture report of attendee engagement. Video webinars can be recorded and later shared with the group along with a full transcript, file attachments, and any discussions from the chat window of a video or call. From custom backdrops, and screen sharing, to virtual chalkboards and collaborative documents, there isn’t much you can’t do remote anymore, making tools like these imperative when returning to the physical office.

Other tools such as Slack and Microsoft Teams reduce the amount of emails needed in a work day, by offering one, cohesive platform for teams to communicate. Mural is another online tool for ideation sessions, providing a more visual-based platform to facilitate blue-sky thinking.

Connection without distraction

Video conferencing technologies like Zoom are here to stay. Especially since many white-collar corporations are extending the work-from-home period until as late as next summer. This means many workers will need a hybrid environment to connect with clients, colleagues, and business partners. Many will still want their own desk space to retreat to for heads down work, but the popular open concept environments aren’t conducive for lengthy zoom meetings or other new-age virtual tasks.

Rethinking conference rooms of all sizes is one way to accommodate these new hybrid environments. Because guests, clients, and other visitors from outside of an organization are less likely to go into an office that isn’t theirs, large conference rooms, both within the tenant space, and the shared building, sit empty and unused.

These underutilized meeting rooms can be transformed to a few different types of meeting areas:

• Production Pod – For one-on-one video conferencing meetings, a place where employees can go to chat with their colleague who may be working from home, or their client who may not be comfortable coming into the office. Although there isn’t much square footage needed, the room must be sound proof, and equipped with all the AV technology needed to perform a seamless video call, including a large monitor with easy connection to a laptop, a power source, and good lighting for video visibility.
• Collaboration Suite – A little bigger and can accommodate a larger group. This room comes with everything the smaller production pod includes, but with an even bigger monitor with an auto-framing video camera to track and focus on who in the room is speaking and stacked theater seating for visibility. Creating a physical destination that puts blended teams on equal footing.
• Presentation Studio – A production room equipped with podcast equipment, a green screen, advanced sound and recording tools, will be beneficial for employees creating more elevated, digital content that will continue to remain the norm, years after the pandemic.

Essential safety
Revolutionary technologies are improving quality of life for millions of Americans living through this global pandemic. Telehealth services are increasing in popularity due to COVID-19, offering a safe way for patients to stay out of overwhelmed healthcare systems and prevent the risk of exposure. Smartphone and wearable technology tracking has even been used to trace contact of those infected with the virus.
When employees return to work, these types of technologies can make a huge difference. Employers and landlords can start small with zero-touch adjustments like automated doors and motion sensor lighting. Steelcase’s RoomWizard is a completely hands-free solution for meeting room reservations. Employees simply walk into an available room and begin working and the smart technology marks the room in-use.
Larger investments include innovative technologies such as body temperature walk-through kiosks, germicidal UV light, and more. Investing in technologies that make employees feel safe can go a long way and hold significant value.

In the end, the key to success when returning to work will be change management. Think about how quickly we’ve all adjusted to day-to-day routines like working from home, going to the grocery store, and dining out at restaurants. Wearing masks, temperature checks, and social distancing were once foreign behaviors none of us ever had to practice, a few short months later, it seems normal. Managing expectations and offering the tools and environment needed to communicate, connect, collaborate, and stay safe will set employees up for success and get them excited to return to the new workplace destination.