Getting the right mix of meeting-room sizes has become a conundrum for office tenants and their landlords.

While wellness, staff space utilisation and collaborative spaces were once considered a "tick the box" exercise for companies, in the same way as having a "green star" sustainable property, they are now seen as mainstream must-haves.

In this new age of activity-based working, more commonly referred to as hot desking, taking into account the size of a meeting room is now a serious matter.

For office tenants, is that large meeting room generally used by two people at a time, a waste of money?

And given there are more new buildings coming out of the ground throughout the country than in the past decade, the internal fit-outs are being organised with scientific precision.

Mirvac, Charter Hall, Lend Lease, Brookfield Property Partners and Investa are all in the thick of constructing new skyscrapers and are working closely with their tenants to create the office of the future.

That will have more space devoted to the "wellness" of staff, be of sustainable design, indoor air quality, natural light, fresh air to private relaxation spaces and better-equipped tearoom with healthy snacks in the vending machine.

There will also be the ubiquitous meeting room, but even that is under the spotlight for a revamp.

A new report by CBRE, Space Utilisation: The Next Frontier, shows most organisations build more larger meeting rooms, but most meetings are small in size.

"Right sizing" meeting rooms creates a huge efficiency opportunity.

CBRE's  Pacific director of workplace strategy Matt Strudwick​ said the report, based on CBRE clients in 14 countries, shows only 30 per cent of the available space in a meeting room is used.

Meaning there is 70 per cent of unoccupied, wasted area that could be put to more-productive use.

"This finding points to significant opportunities to convert meeting rooms to multipurpose spaces and increase their utilisation. CBRE believes that the optimal level of space utilisation for meeting areas should be between 40-60 per cent," the report says.

"Meetings are becoming more intimate. This means that a greater number of smaller meeting areas and collaborative spaces are required."

Rents are the second-biggest cost for a company after the payroll, so having wasted space is a waste of money.

Another issue for new workplaces is cramming staff into smaller spaces.

The adoption of a flexible workspace, where no one has a set desk any more, has led to companies installing smaller spaces, usually in one long line.

Mr Strudwick said in considering density targets and planning for the future,  it was important for organisations to remember the purpose of their workplace – typically, to provide an environment for their people to be as productive as possible.

He said CBRE regards less than 5.57 square metres a desk as a clear productivity danger zone; reducing space below this level places staff productivity, performance and retention at risk.