What is a Desk Booking System and Why it’s Essential for Hybrid Working
Miro Miroslavov
CEO and Co-founder of OfficeRnD
4 mins read
Published: Mar 22, 2022 Last updated: Mar 21, 2023
Table of Contents:
A desk booking system is a software platform that’s fundamental for any organization enabling flexible and hybrid ways of working. All desk booking systems enable users to essentially book desks before coming to the office. However, the most important elements of good desk booking software are:
How easy it is for employees to book desks.
How customizable the system is to support the agility of teams and organizations.
Hybrid work is a workplace model where employees work partly from the office and partly remotely. The foundation of the hybrid work model is flexibility for employees to work from anywhere. A few years down the line of the hybrid work experiment, we can confidently say that the most viable and economic option for creating a hybrid workplace is desk sharing – desk hoteling (sometimes called office hoteling), in combination with hot desking. Therefore, the most viable option to enable desk sharing and thus hybrid work is through a proper desk booking system.
What is a Desk Booking System?
Desk booking systems have a long, not very bright, history and likely a long, very bright future.
Most desk booking software solutions of the past used to be part of the so-called Integrated Workplace Management Systems (IWMS). These complex, cumbersome software platforms were mostly used for managing the complexity of the real estate, as well as the space and facility management needs of corporate customers. The desk booking component of a typical IWMS was usually handling only hot desk bookings via a kiosk installed in the office. This is a suboptimal user experience, for sure, and almost as bad as a hot desk booking template in excel.
The focus of the desk reservation systems of the future though is all about ease of use and employee workplace experience. Technology is so deeply ingrained in our life and so the workplace must be too. However, in order to get there, desk booking apps have to be at least as good as the apps we use on a daily basis, if not better.
Ease of use – Book from anywhere, work from anywhere
Your main focus when choosing a desk booking solution should be the ease of use and potential reach of the application. The adoption of your booking platform and your employee satisfaction relies heavily on that. You really want to enable booking on all screens.
Book from a Web portal; We spend our working days in the browser and it is still the #1 utilized way of booking desks.
Book from a Mobile app; Your desk booking system must have an extremely easy-to-use and awesome hot desk app for iOS and Android.
Integrate a Calendar solution – Outlook or Google Calendar; Your system must be extremely well integrated with your organization’s calendar system.
Book from a Collaboration system – Teams or Slack; Your booking system must be where your people are – in your messaging system, like Microsoft Teams.
Book from Google Chrome; Most people use Google Chrome and having your booking system deeply integrated into the browser can make it like a million times easier to reserve a space.
We use many screens for many reasons in our daily life. Your desk scheduling software should be available anywhere in order to increase your employee adoption and satisfaction, thus your use of office space.
System Customization and Configuration
The modern desk scheduling systems are highly customizable and configurable to suit your need for agility. Some of the more important elements you should look for include:
Configurable interactive floorplan management, where everyone can see who’s in the office, as well as track available desks in real-time.
Delegated desk bookings; Such functionality enables your team leaders and managers to place bookings for their teams.
Recurring desk bookings; Arguably, one of the most important features that will make the lives of your employees a lot easier is recurring bookings. This way, they can build work patterns, like coming to the office every Tuesday and Thursday.
Private desk bookings; In some cases, you may want to book a desk or a space with limited visibility.
Desk booking policies; You may want to allow employees access to book desks in only certain areas, locations, zones, or neighborhoods.
Easy to use, or automated check-in system; You should also measure the true occupancy by requiring employees to check in or fully automating them through integrations.
Configurable and white-label web, mobile and integrations experience; Your employees should easily recognize your brand.
Collaboration and Smart Scheduling capabilities; Coming to the office is a team play, so you should enable your teams to collaboratively reserve spaces.
Advanced analytics; Last but not least, you should collect, measure and analyze all data about your desk utilization. This way you can adjust your space to the needs of your employees.
What are the Benefits of Desk Booking Software?
A good desk booking solution can help you create a more productive and collaborative workplace experience for your employees. Furthermore, by implementing desk hoteling or hot desking strategy, you can optimize your workspace utilization, and get more out of your real estate, thus reducing your costs.
It sounds simple, however, the benefit exceeds many times the investment in an easy-to-use, customizable desk booking system, such as OfficeRnD Hybrid (which, in addition to desk booking, also lets team members make meeting room bookings).
How to Get Started with a Desk Booking System?
The easiest way to start is by talking to one of our workplace experts about desk booking and hybrid work software. You can book a time slot here. Or you can try it yourself by starting a free trial! It is as easy as 1,2,3!
Happy hybrid working! We hope to see you all collaborating in the offices. 🙂
Start for free with OfficeRnD Hybrid:
Get all essential features and integrations for up to 30 users and 30 resources for
free!
Miro Miroslavov is a software engineer turned into a tech entrepreneur. In 2015 he co-founded OfficeRnD - a leading flex space and hybrid work management platform. As a CEO at OfficeRnD, he grew the company from inception to a leading software vendor that serves thousands of customers worldwide. He is a big fan of flexible working and is on a mission to "Making Flexible Working the Way of Working".
Set up the system on your own, following our detailed video guide. We will send you a step-by-step daily email with video tutorials on how to configure OfficeRnD. Once you аre ready, we will put you in contact with an onboarding specialist for up to 2 hours of Q&A sessions, where you can ask questions and verify your setup.
Key Details
PriceFREE
SettingRemote
Duration2h
Overview
Take advantage of this 6-hour dedicated onboarding process during which our team helps you set OfficeRnD up following best practices. We will start with a short kick-off session to discuss your current processes, timelines, integrations and outline a step-by-step plan to ensure the smooth adoption of the system on your end. Our Onboarding Specialists will make the most effective use of your time together working to empower you to take full advantage of the system capabilities on your own.
What’s Included:
Together we will outline an onboarding plan with action items and milestones.
We will regularly review the progress of the setup and guide you to the next steps.
Together we will create strategies for addressing complex use cases.
We will guide you over email and screen-sharing calls.
We will extensively review the final setup of the system and be available to immediately jump on a call on the go-live date.
We will help you set up and run your first bill run. We will also help you automate all the others.
2 training modules.
Key Details
Price$299
SettingRemote
Duration6h
Overview
This onboarding package is best for multi-location teams with complicated workflows. We will start with a short kick-off session to discuss your current processes, timelines, integrations and outline a step-by-step plan to ensure the smooth adoption of the system on your end. Our Onboarding Specialists will make the most effective use of your time together working to empower you to take full advantage of the system capabilities and reporting tools on your own.
What’s Included:
Together we will outline an onboarding plan with action items and milestones.
We will regularly review the progress of the setup and guide you to the next steps.
Together we will create strategies for addressing complex use cases.
We will guide you over email and screen-sharing calls.
We will extensively review the final setup of the system and be available to immediately jump on a call on the go-live date.
We will help you set up and run your first bill run. We will also help you automate all the others.
4 training modules
Key Details
Price$599
SettingRemote
Duration12h
Overview
Get familiar with the essentials in the Basic Support Package.
What’s Included:
Email & Chat Support – Our support team is available to customers via chat and email at [email protected] Monday-Friday from 7:00AM to 5:00PM UTC.
Monthly Training Webinars – Joins us monthly for a short and focused webinar on the features of OfficeRnD where our team discusses how to best take advantage of different parts of the system and addresses commonly asked questions.
Onboarding – Basic onboarding
Initial Response Time – Normal severity (24h), Restricted Operation (24h) and Critical (4h)
Key Details
PriceFREE
Setting Remote
Overview
Get familiar with the essentials in the Standard Support Package.
What’s Included:
Email & Chat Support – Our support team is available to customers via chat and email at [email protected] Monday-Friday from 7:00AM to 5:00PM UTC.
Monthly Training Webinars – Joins us monthly for a short and focused webinar on the features of OfficeRnD where our team discusses how to best take advantage of different parts of the system and addresses commonly asked questions.
Dedicated Q&A Support Sessions (1 hour / month) – Get direct access to one of our lead support specialists and book up to 4 hours of screen-sharing calls per month.
Onboarding – Basic Onboarding
Initial Response Time – Normal severity (24h), Restricted Operation (16h) and Critical (4h)
Key details
Price$149
SettingRemote
Overview
Get familiar with the essentials in the Premium Support Package.
What’s Included:
Email & Chat Support – Our support team is available to customers via chat and email at [email protected] Monday-Friday from 7:00AM to 5:00PM UTC.
Monthly Training Webinars – Joins us monthly for a short and focused webinar on the features of OfficeRnD where our team discusses how to best take advantage of different parts of the system and addresses commonly asked questions.
Dedicated Q&A Support Sessions (4 hours / month) – Get direct access to one of our lead support specialists and book up to 4 hours of screen-sharing calls per month.
Onboarding – Basic Onboarding
Initial Response Time – Normal severity (24h), Restricted Operation (8h) and Critical (1h)
Key details
Price$299
SettingRemote
Overview
Get direct access to one of our lead support specialists and book up to 4 hours of screen-sharing calls per month with them.
What’s Included:
You get direct access to a lead support specialist.
We will prioritize your support requests.
Together we will discuss strategies for addressing custom use cases.
Together we will discuss your feature requests.
Together we will troubleshoot any issues.
We will show you the latest new features in the system.
Key Details
Price$150/month
SettingRemote
Duration4h/month
Overview
We will cover the basic CRM functionalities OfficeRnD supports. We will show you how to create, update and delete companies, members and opportunities. We will show you how to create custom properties to better describe them. We’ll demonstrate how to create memberships for members, change their status and invite them on the members portal.
Learn How To:
Add a company.
Add a company member.
Add an individual member.
Assign a membership to a member.
Invoice memberships in 3,6 or 12-month periods.
Add a one-off fee to a member’s profile.
Invite a member to the members portal.
Invite multiple members to the members portal.
Change the email of a member.
Pause a membership.
Mark companies and members as former and what that means for their access to the portal.
Manually add day passes.
Add custom properties to a company/member.
Extend the information captured for opportunities.
Key Details
Price$150
SettingRemote
Duration60min
Overview
We will cover all billing options available in OfficeRnD. We will show you how to create tax rates and revenue accounts, how will they be applied on invoices and what discounting options the system provides. We will demonstrate how to create invoices and manually run the bill run. We will also together review the billing settings in the system and automate the billing operations.
Learn How To:
Configure your tax rates and revenue accounts.
Add discounts and apply those to memberships.
Review the billing settings and automate billing operations.
Raise an invoice
Raise multiple invoices with a manual BillRun.
Understand invoice statuses.
Edit an invoice.
Charge invoices.
Record a refund on invoices.
Create an invoice for a period of longer than 1 month.
Review outstanding not-invoiced fees and memberships.
Key Details
Price$150
SettingRemote
Duration60min
Overview
We will show you how to create meeting rooms and configure their pricing options, booking and cancellation policies. We will cover how to create booking credits – hourly and value-based. We will demonstrate how to make a booking and how to review its corresponding fee.
Learn How To:
Understand resource rates and how to add one.
Add a meeting room and set its privacy.
Configure booking and cancellation policies.
Add a booking.
Update and cancel a booking.
Add extras as purchasable options available with a meeting room booking.
Manually add booking credits to members.
Invoice bookings.
Review bookings and take advantage of the Bookings Report.
Change the business hours of the space.
Change the visibility of the bookings on the members portal.
Key Details
Price$150
SettingRemote
Duration60min
Overview
We will go over what a contract is, what are its building blocks, and what types of contracts OfficeRnD provides. We will show you how to create contracts, how to sign and how-to terminate them. We will also discuss the lifecycle of each contract.
Learn How To:
Use contracts and what they are for.
Create a Membership Agreement, a License Agreement or a Lease Agreement.
Add a contract.
Generate a contract PDF document.
Sign a contract.
Differentiate memberships attached to a contract.
Different stages of a contract and how to terminate it.
Configure and implement a contract approval process.
Key Details
Price$100
SettingRemote
Duration30min
Overview
We will show you the default resource types available in OfficeRnD. We will cover how they can be edited and when should you create custom resource types. We will demonstrate how to assign memberships on the floorplan and how to accommodate floorplan changes.
Learn How To:
Understand the default resource types and how to track their occupancy and utilization.
Create private offices and desks.
Assign resources to members.
Assign memberships on the floorplan.
Relocate a membership.
Upgrade or downgrade a membership on the floorplan.
Change a meeting room to an office and vice versa.
Replace a dedicated desk with a hotdesk and vice versa.
Create custom resource types.
Key Details
Price$100
SettingRemote
Duration30min
Overview
We will cover how to collaborate with members via the members portal and the mobile app. We will show you how to create posts and events. We will demonstrate how to upload information about benefits and different how-to guides on the members portal. We will also go through integrations that power up collaboration with members.
Learn How To:
Take a short overview of the members portal and the different type of users and their permissions.
Add posts.
Add events.
Add benefits.
Add How-To Guides.
Find where members can add issues and where you can review them.
Set up integration with Slack and its benefits.
Connect OfficeRnD with Eventbrite using Zapier.
Key Details
Price$100
SettingRemote
Duration30min
Overview
We will cover the billing reports available in the system. We will show you how to use each one and dive deeper into the data it exposes.
Learn How To:
Find the billing charts available on the OfficeRnD Dashboard
Use the Revenue Dashboard
Use the Memberships Dashboard
Use the Projected Revenue Report
Use the Invoiced Revenue Report
Export invoices.
Customize the invoices export.
Use the Memberships Report.
Use the Members Report.
Key Details
Price$100
SettingRemote
Duration30min
Overview
We will cover the occupancy and utilization reports available in the system. We will show you how to use each one and dive deeper into the data it exposes.
Learn How To:
Use the Occupancy Dashboards.
Use the Occupancy Report for private offices and dedicated desks.
Use the Occupancy Interval report.
Use the Resource Utilization report.
Key Details
Price$100
SettingRemote
Duration30min
Overview
Set up the system on your own, following our detailed video guide. We will send you a step-by-step daily email with video tutorials on how to configure OfficeRnD. Once you аre ready, we will put you in contact with an onboarding specialist for up to 2 hours of Q&A sessions, where you can ask questions and verify your setup.
Key Details
PriceFREE
SettingRemote
Duration2h
Overview
Take advantage of this 6-hour dedicated onboarding process during which our team helps you set OfficeRnD up following best practices. We will start with a short kick-off session to discuss your current processes, timelines, integrations and outline a step-by-step plan to ensure the smooth adoption of the system on your end. Our Onboarding Specialists will make the most effective use of your time together working to empower you to take full advantage of the system capabilities on your own.
What’s Included:
Together we will outline an onboarding plan with action items and milestones.
We will regularly review the progress of the setup and guide you to the next steps.
Together we will create strategies for addressing complex use cases.
We will guide you over email and screen-sharing calls.
We will extensively review the final setup of the system and be available to immediately jump on a call on the go-live date.
We will help you set up and run your first bill run. We will also help you automate all the others.
2 training modules.
Key Details
Price$299
SettingRemote
Duration6h
Overview
This onboarding package is best for multi-location teams with complicated workflows. We will start with a short kick-off session to discuss your current processes, timelines, integrations and outline a step-by-step plan to ensure the smooth adoption of the system on your end. Our Onboarding Specialists will make the most effective use of your time together working to empower you to take full advantage of the system capabilities and reporting tools on your own.
What’s Included:
Together we will outline an onboarding plan with action items and milestones.
We will regularly review the progress of the setup and guide you to the next steps.
Together we will create strategies for addressing complex use cases.
We will guide you over email and screen-sharing calls.
We will extensively review the final setup of the system and be available to immediately jump on a call on the go-live date.
We will help you set up and run your first bill run. We will also help you automate all the others.
4 training modules
Key Details
Price$599
SettingRemote
Duration12h
Overview
Get familiar with the essentials in the Basic Support Package.
What’s Included:
Email & Chat Support – Our support team is available to customers via chat and email at [email protected] Monday-Friday from 7:00AM to 5:00PM UTC.
Monthly Training Webinars – Joins us monthly for a short and focused webinar on the features of OfficeRnD where our team discusses how to best take advantage of different parts of the system and addresses commonly asked questions.
Onboarding – Basic onboarding
Initial Response Time – Normal severity (24h), Restricted Operation (24h) and Critical (4h)
Key Details
PriceFREE
Setting Remote
Overview
Get familiar with the essentials in the Standard Support Package.
What’s Included:
Email & Chat Support – Our support team is available to customers via chat and email at [email protected] Monday-Friday from 7:00AM to 5:00PM UTC.
Monthly Training Webinars – Joins us monthly for a short and focused webinar on the features of OfficeRnD where our team discusses how to best take advantage of different parts of the system and addresses commonly asked questions.
Dedicated Q&A Support Sessions (1 hour / month) – Get direct access to one of our lead support specialists and book up to 4 hours of screen-sharing calls per month.
Onboarding – Basic Onboarding
Initial Response Time – Normal severity (24h), Restricted Operation (16h) and Critical (4h)
Key details
Price$149
SettingRemote
Overview
Get familiar with the essentials in the Premium Support Package.
What’s Included:
Email & Chat Support – Our support team is available to customers via chat and email at [email protected] Monday-Friday from 7:00AM to 5:00PM UTC.
Monthly Training Webinars – Joins us monthly for a short and focused webinar on the features of OfficeRnD where our team discusses how to best take advantage of different parts of the system and addresses commonly asked questions.
Dedicated Q&A Support Sessions (4 hours / month) – Get direct access to one of our lead support specialists and book up to 4 hours of screen-sharing calls per month.
Onboarding – Basic Onboarding
Initial Response Time – Normal severity (24h), Restricted Operation (8h) and Critical (1h)
Key details
Price$299
SettingRemote
Overview
Get direct access to one of our lead support specialists and book up to 4 hours of screen-sharing calls per month with them.
What’s Included:
You get direct access to a lead support specialist.
We will prioritize your support requests.
Together we will discuss strategies for addressing custom use cases.
Together we will discuss your feature requests.
Together we will troubleshoot any issues.
We will show you the latest new features in the system.
Key Details
Price$150/month
SettingRemote
Duration4h/month
Overview
We will cover the basic CRM functionalities OfficeRnD supports. We will show you how to create, update and delete companies, members and opportunities. We will show you how to create custom properties to better describe them. We’ll demonstrate how to create memberships for members, change their status and invite them on the members portal.
Learn How To:
Add a company.
Add a company member.
Add an individual member.
Assign a membership to a member.
Invoice memberships in 3,6 or 12-month periods.
Add a one-off fee to a member’s profile.
Invite a member to the members portal.
Invite multiple members to the members portal.
Change the email of a member.
Pause a membership.
Mark companies and members as former and what that means for their access to the portal.
Manually add day passes.
Add custom properties to a company/member.
Extend the information captured for opportunities.
Key Details
Price$150
SettingRemote
Duration60min
Overview
We will cover all billing options available in OfficeRnD. We will show you how to create tax rates and revenue accounts, how will they be applied on invoices and what discounting options the system provides. We will demonstrate how to create invoices and manually run the bill run. We will also together review the billing settings in the system and automate the billing operations.
Learn How To:
Configure your tax rates and revenue accounts.
Add discounts and apply those to memberships.
Review the billing settings and automate billing operations.
Raise an invoice
Raise multiple invoices with a manual BillRun.
Understand invoice statuses.
Edit an invoice.
Charge invoices.
Record a refund on invoices.
Create an invoice for a period of longer than 1 month.
Review outstanding not-invoiced fees and memberships.
Key Details
Price$150
SettingRemote
Duration60min
Overview
We will show you how to create meeting rooms and configure their pricing options, booking and cancellation policies. We will cover how to create booking credits – hourly and value-based. We will demonstrate how to make a booking and how to review its corresponding fee.
Learn How To:
Understand resource rates and how to add one.
Add a meeting room and set its privacy.
Configure booking and cancellation policies.
Add a booking.
Update and cancel a booking.
Add extras as purchasable options available with a meeting room booking.
Manually add booking credits to members.
Invoice bookings.
Review bookings and take advantage of the Bookings Report.
Change the business hours of the space.
Change the visibility of the bookings on the members portal.
Key Details
Price$150
SettingRemote
Duration60min
Overview
We will go over what a contract is, what are its building blocks, and what types of contracts OfficeRnD provides. We will show you how to create contracts, how to sign and how-to terminate them. We will also discuss the lifecycle of each contract.
Learn How To:
Use contracts and what they are for.
Create a Membership Agreement, a License Agreement or a Lease Agreement.
Add a contract.
Generate a contract PDF document.
Sign a contract.
Differentiate memberships attached to a contract.
Different stages of a contract and how to terminate it.
Configure and implement a contract approval process.
Key Details
Price$100
SettingRemote
Duration30min
Overview
We will show you the default resource types available in OfficeRnD. We will cover how they can be edited and when should you create custom resource types. We will demonstrate how to assign memberships on the floorplan and how to accommodate floorplan changes.
Learn How To:
Understand the default resource types and how to track their occupancy and utilization.
Create private offices and desks.
Assign resources to members.
Assign memberships on the floorplan.
Relocate a membership.
Upgrade or downgrade a membership on the floorplan.
Change a meeting room to an office and vice versa.
Replace a dedicated desk with a hotdesk and vice versa.
Create custom resource types.
Key Details
Price$100
SettingRemote
Duration30min
Overview
We will cover how to collaborate with members via the members portal and the mobile app. We will show you how to create posts and events. We will demonstrate how to upload information about benefits and different how-to guides on the members portal. We will also go through integrations that power up collaboration with members.
Learn How To:
Take a short overview of the members portal and the different type of users and their permissions.
Add posts.
Add events.
Add benefits.
Add How-To Guides.
Find where members can add issues and where you can review them.
Set up integration with Slack and its benefits.
Connect OfficeRnD with Eventbrite using Zapier.
Key Details
Price$100
SettingRemote
Duration30min
Overview
We will cover the billing reports available in the system. We will show you how to use each one and dive deeper into the data it exposes.
Learn How To:
Find the billing charts available on the OfficeRnD Dashboard
Use the Revenue Dashboard
Use the Memberships Dashboard
Use the Projected Revenue Report
Use the Invoiced Revenue Report
Export invoices.
Customize the invoices export.
Use the Memberships Report.
Use the Members Report.
Key Details
Price$100
SettingRemote
Duration30min
Overview
We will cover the occupancy and utilization reports available in the system. We will show you how to use each one and dive deeper into the data it exposes.
Learn How To:
Use the Occupancy Dashboards.
Use the Occupancy Report for private offices and dedicated desks.