The future of work is being actively reshaped across the Middle East. WORKTECH26 Dubai brings together thought leaders from corporate real estate, workplace strategy, technology and HR to explore the forces redefining how organisations design, manage and experience the office. The conference programme will examine the return-to-office reset, AI-driven decision-making, smart-building innovation and the shift towards experience-led workplaces – offering insight into the key drivers of change that will shape portfolios, performance and people strategies across the region.
- DUBAI
CONFERENCE AGENDA
Registration Opens
Conference Opens
Chairperson's Welcome
Keynote
Resetting the Corporate Real Estate Playbook for the Return-to-Office
Organisations across Dubai and Abu Dhabi are reassessing the assumptions that shaped the hybrid‑work era. After years of downsizing and consolidation, leadership teams are now enforcing stronger return‑to‑office mandates, expanding headcounts and competing for limited high‑quality space. Corporate real estate leaders are under pressure to redesign and rebalance their portfolios for 2026 and beyond. This opening panel brings together leading voices in corporate real estate, workplace strategy and smart‑building innovation to explore the shift from density‑driven planning to experience‑led workplaces. The discussion will examine how AI and data are accelerating decision‑making, the financial implications of this new operating environment and the growing need for cross‑functional alignment.
Coffee Break and Networking
Session Title To Be Announced
How AI Will Enable a Return to Meaningful Workplace Design
As workplaces face rising pressure to become more sustainable, efficient and culturally relevant, AI presents a chance to break free from generic design and create environments genuinely shaped by local context and human need. The challenge is pairing this design potential with clear financial returns and technology frameworks that can scale across complex portfolios. This presentation explores how AI can help deliver workplaces that are smarter, more adaptive and meaningfully connected to their environment.
AI as the New Engine of Workplace and Portfolio Strategy
AI and PropTech are rapidly transforming how organisations plan, measure and deliver real estate. From utilisation analytics across vast geographies to scalable, bookable workspace systems, data driven tools are enabling more flexible portfolios and healthier, more responsive environments. AI is reshaping the design and delivery process; deepening strategic insight, strengthening programming, reducing variation orders and smoothing coordination between designers, contractors and suppliers. This session uncovers how these technologies are creating faster, smarter and more predictable outcomes.
Innovation platform
Designing Mindful Workplaces for Belonging, Performance and Cultural Diversity
How can furniture and space design shape inclusion in practice? In this short session, Sinem Beaujean will introduce Sedus’ Inclusive Journey and show how the Mindful Office framework translates inclusion into concrete workplace solutions. She will close with direct questions designed to spark reflection and continue the conversation during the lunch activation at the Sedus space.
Lunch and Networking Break
Welcome Back
Session Title To Be Announced
Session Title To Be Announced
Session Title To Be Announced
Designing for Utilization Extremes
Content to be confirmed.
Coffee & Networking Break
Welcome Back
Form and the Formation of Culture
Workplace design isn’t just walls and furniture, it’s the invisible script that shapes how we think, interact and belong. The spaces we inhabit write the culture we live. Every corner, corridor and surface in the workplace whispers rules, values and possibilities. Design doesn’t just house work, but it guides it.
Session Title To Be Announced
Workplace Re-Imagined
A fireside chat exploring how a major workplace transformation can serve as a catalyst for broader organizational change. Starting from one prominent Dubai banking example, the conversation will unpack how the UAE financial sector is reimagining outdated offices through phased relocations, HQ upgrades, flexible workspace pilots supporting non‑fixed, multi‑location work models and more agile real‑estate strategies. It will consider how technology, wellness priorities and a strengthened employee value proposition are increasingly at the heart of next‑generation workplace design in the region.
Chair's Closing Remarks
Conference Closes
Resetting the Real Estate Playbook: Portfolio Transformation for a New Dubai
Dubai’s workplace market is entering a new phase as organisations respond to stronger office attendance, business growth and increasing demand for high-quality space. Corporate occupiers are reassessing portfolios shaped during the hybrid-work era and exploring how relocations, headquarters upgrades and flexible workspace models can support future growth. This theme examines how leaders are balancing limited supply, rising costs and changing workforce expectations while using workplace transformation as a catalyst for broader organisational change.
AI-Powered Workplace Strategy: From Data to Better Decisions
Artificial intelligence is reshaping how organisations plan, design and operate workplaces across the region. From portfolio scenario modelling and utilisation analysis to predictive facilities management and more adaptive employee experiences, AI is creating opportunities to make faster and more informed decisions. This theme explores how workplace, real estate and technology leaders can move beyond disconnected tools toward integrated intelligence, while maintaining human judgement, transparency and trust as AI becomes embedded in workplace strategy.
Culture by Design: Belonging, Inclusion and Human Performance
Workplace design does more than accommodate people—it influences how they communicate, collaborate and experience organisational culture. In Dubai’s highly diverse and multicultural business environment, space can play a particularly important role in creating belonging, supporting wellbeing and connecting people across different backgrounds and working styles. This theme explores how movement, furniture, spatial planning and workplace experience can strengthen inclusion, encourage meaningful interaction and create environments where people can perform at their best.
The Workplace as a Platform for Organisational Change
Major workplace projects are increasingly being used to support wider transformation across culture, technology, operations and employee experience. Rather than treating the office as a completed design project, organisations are developing more flexible workplace models that can evolve alongside changing business needs. This theme explores how leaders are using phased relocations, agile real-estate strategies, shared environments and new workplace technologies to modernise established organisations and create more connected, responsive and future-ready workplaces.
