IMHO the concept of co-working is about collaboration, community and sharing knowledge and insights. The business model you use to achieve this needs to support the community aspect. Basically business or non-profit model and community need to co-exist and support each other.

I recently started a for profit casual work space and private offices in downtown Ottawa, Canada. http://www.thecodefactory.ca The primary driver for the business model was that in order to secure my fitup and furniture loan from the bank the business needed to be for profit.

Is for profit or non-profit a better model probably really depends on what works best for the person or team founding the space. The model you choose should pretty much be transparent to the people using the space *unless it is a coop or the like). I actually have two advisory boards one for the business (looking after all of those business type issues) and a community advisory board that ensures accountability, transparency and adherence to our Mission Vision and Values.

My favorite for profit company is Google and one of their founding principles is “Don’t be evil”. I like Google think they have a great culture, work ethic and are superior innovators.

I firmly believe that a space can use a for profit model and at the same time provide a collaborative environment.

What you and the guys are planning to do is fantastic and I really enjoyed chatting through the plans in Charlies the other day, but it is very important to choose the right option from the get go, and the wrong option could result in the death of the project.

Charities can be corrupt, are hard to get money from, have higher insurance and fund it difficult to find funding from government bodies. Last year the Director and Finance Director of Action cancer ‘resigned’ whilst under investigation regarding finance. This press give’s charities a bad name.

Although the scouting movement has a volunteer structure right from the helpers right up through the district managers to the Chief Scout (Peter Duncan of Blue Peter fame) we do understand that some people do need to be employed and as such we do employ administration staff however no director or board member receives a salary.

For me I feel the best road for co-working Belfast is either to Operate a not for profit business whereby an admin person is paid a small amount of money to keep the place ticking over and the rest of the money is put to a good cause, Wireless camp for example.

Or the other way which could be a great way to run it, which would really suit the ethos is a co-op where by everyone involved owns a slice of the business and is involved in the end goal of a cheap – effective working space where ideas and start ups can be born.