Despina Katsikakis

Despina Katsikakis is an industry leader with an international reputation for thought leadership and innovation, on the impact of the workplace, on people and business performance. She serves as an independent adviser to corporate occupiers, real estate developers and investment funds.

A former Chairman of international consultancy DEGW and recently with Barclays Corporate Real Estate, Despina has over 30 years’ experience working with corporate occupiers at board level, guiding them on how to use their workplace to affect culture and how to align corporate policies and processes to support innovation and employee engagement.

With clients including Accenture, BBC, BP, Cisco, Deutsche Bank, GSK, Google, Microsoft, Morgan Stanley, Siemens and Unilever, she has developed ground-breaking initiatives and has an extensive track record of successfully implemented global workplace programs that have delivered significant improvements to people and business performance.

She leverages her understanding of corporate occupiers and future trends to advise cities, commercial real estate developers, investment funds and their design teams on how to differentiate and future proof award winning schemes around the world.

Despina is passionate that the built environment should be developed with a clear purpose and focus on the impact it has on people, society and the environment.

She regularly lectures around the world, writes and contributes to media, research and publications on the future of the workplace.