EY relocates 600-strong North West team to Manchester’s 2 St Peter’s Square

Professional services giant EY has relocated its North West team to a new office at 2 St Peter’s Square.

The company’s 600-strong workforce in the region will occupy 42,000 sq ft across the development’s 8th, 9th and 10th floors.

EY is the first tenant to move into the building, which has interiors reflective of Manchester’s industrial heritage designed by architects Perkins+Will.

The open-plan design offers flexibility by enabling staff to choose workspace based on the task at hand, rather than their level. Areas include space for team collaboration or private, focused work.

EY said technology is now a key element of the flexibility within its offices. The firm’s North West base has swapped traditional desktop phone handsets for Skype functionality, with all meeting rooms equipped with video and audio conferencing technology.

EY’s senior North West partner, Bob Ward, said: “The move to 2 St Peter’s Square is an important one for us all at EY. It’s a fabulous new building in a superb location which the team is really excited about.

“However it’s much more than just having a new physical space in which to work – though we have made it as modern and inspiring as possible. It’s about enabling a different way of working.”

Sam Woodward, the project’s partner sponsor, commented: “We have created a space that allows our people to work at their best, focusing not on where they work, but how they work.

“It’s a flexible and fluid space using state of the art design and technology to allow people to plug into the type of work environment they need at that moment – whether that is collaborating with their team, finding a private space for confidential work, connecting with clients and colleagues across the globe easily and quickly or taking five for a well-earned break.”

The move to 2 St Peter’s Square forms part of the company’s international EY@Work programme. The initiative – aiming to create working environments designed around how people work, rather than where they work – has been rolled out across 100 EY locations to date.