Tag: co-working

Co-Working….somewhere near Tipperary?

While I was off cruising around Northern Europe and Scandinavia, Evert wrote about setting up a co-working centre: Spurred on by posts on co-working.ie and a recent post on Techcrunch UK I’ve decided to get serious with my plans for a Co-working/techhub/start-up center. While I have certain ideas on how I would like to setup … Continue reading “Co-Working….somewhere near Tipperary?”

While I was off cruising around Northern Europe and Scandinavia, Evert wrote about setting up a co-working centre:

Spurred on by posts on co-working.ie and a recent post on Techcrunch UK I’ve decided to get serious with my plans for a Co-working/techhub/start-up center. While I have certain ideas on how I would like to setup & run such a center I need the input of potential users. I do not intend to run it for my own benefit so rather than just come up with a list of requirements myself I am looking for input from outside sources.

Paul Campbell’s comment holds a lot of water in my books:

From your list, I’d say only the following are necessary:
– post boxes
– fast broadband (most necessary)
– out-off hours access (definitely, keys ftw)
– security, storage facilities (generally a place that is free from potential theft is good)

Evert has kept it close to his chest where he intends to open this centre but it seems to be off the N7 somewhere near Nenagh.

The most basic co-working facility really just needs desks, power and internet. Everything else is really gravy (yeah, even toilets). You can get by on cheap plywood desks (or a door sitting flat across some boxes), wooden chairs and a slow 512 Kbps line. And if the co-working space is important to you, then this is how you’ll set it up much like how it’s possible to write and publish a book while subsisting on 9p Ramen from Tesco or how it might be necessary to sleep a couple of hours under your desk at work rather than bothering with the commute because time is of the essence.

So if it matters, then just do it.

For comfort, however, you’re going to want more. This could be a £350 coffee pod machine, Aeron chairs, multi-megabyte UPLOADS as well as downloads, air-conditioning, natural light, all-hours access, more than one power outlet per person, telephones, secure storage, meeting rooms, scrum areas, whiteboards, projectors and a flesh-and-blood PA – it’s all going to cost money which means you have to pay for these things up-front.

Before all of this, you have to find a place. Unless you know someone who owns property or own it yourself, it’s likely going to involve a commercial lease – and they’re seldom less than 5 years. You might be lucky and get it for less but there are usually onerous problems with that.

Related posts:

  1. Co-Working 2008
  2. A light went on somewhere…
  3. Co-Working guidelines.
  4. What does your (ideal) co-working office look like?

CoWorking: profit or non-profit

LaunchPad CoWorking An interview with Jerome Chang, founder of Blankspaces: Spike: You’re also using a for-profit business model (as is LaunchPad Coworking). How did you decide on this model? Did you take any heat for it? Jerome: I’m all for pushing collaboration and communities — if profit is what it takes to generate more participants … Continue reading “CoWorking: profit or non-profit”

LaunchPad CoWorking
An interview with Jerome Chang, founder of Blankspaces:

Spike: You’re also using a for-profit business model (as is LaunchPad Coworking). How did you decide on this model? Did you take any heat for it?
Jerome: I’m all for pushing collaboration and communities — if profit is what it takes to generate more participants and advance the cultural movement, then profit it is. Between the time and effort, money, and liability, we should be rewarded for that contribution and exposure. Besides, I didn’t know about coworking at all until I’d already started construction, so I was not “influenced” by the altruism.

I’m becoming more and more convinced that a Co-Working site needs to be a ‘company’ as opposed to a ‘charity’.

I’ve seen lots of non-profits fall by the wayside due to the founders needing to move on and it’s hard to find people with the right mentality to take over. I’ve seen non-profits founder because without the extra edge of needing to make a profit (and reaping benefits thereof) the good will can vanish.

I’m well aware that people working at a non-profit can draw salaries and that the non-profit moniker has been used in order to attract attention while the ‘workers’ draw insanely large salaries. I guess I’m not comfortable hiding behind the tax benefits of a non-profit while engaged in something that is creating things ‘for profit’.

But let’s run with the current school of thought. That CoWorkingBelfast will be a non-profit organisation.

That said – if I have anything to do with it, CoWorkingBelfast will have to be a shining light and not just a damp squib. I want it to be excellent, a model place to work and not just a set of desks in a dreary room above a bank. It has to make enough money to survive and prosper and not just be a half-empty space which has to resort to arcane marketing schemes disguised as trade shows in order to generate a bit of coin.

Part of the Co-Working Belfast ethos should, in my opinion, to create ‘industry culture’ in Northern Ireland. That’s got to be more than just creating a web portal (and how many of those have sprung up in the last year or so) but the creation of a lasting legacy, a tradition of fostering creativity in the technology sector. CoWorking is not about technology itself – it’s about connecting people where they were not previously connected.

Part of the culture of CoWorking Belfast should not only be the opportunities and connections which are brought about by proximity but also the potential for fostering tomorrow’s industry (you know, the people who will be paying taxes when you and I are in a home for the elderly). I have a plan which consists of nothing more than a couple of pledges, a holding page on a web site and a monthly bill which I’ll work to find sponsorship for – which will be wholly dedicated to finding people with energy, be they young in body or just young in mind, and giving them a place to work and express their creativity as well as providing mentoring (by using and abusing the people housed in the CoWorking building) – more on this later.

Through this meandering post I’m convincing myself that CoWorkingBelfast can be a no-profit. What do you think?

Related posts:

  1. Co-Working
  2. Coworking Microsupport
  3. coworking.ie
  4. Managers and non-Managers

“Cargotecture”

WebUrbanist: From self-transforming shipping container rooms to towering retail spaces and emergency housing here are ten additional examples of amazing recycled designs… Is the fact that I love the idea of cargo-container buildings just a fad? I think it would be even better as a co-working facility especially if it was completely recycled outfitted by … Continue reading ““Cargotecture””

WebUrbanist:

From self-transforming shipping container rooms to towering retail spaces and emergency housing here are ten additional examples of amazing recycled designs…

Is the fact that I love the idea of cargo-container buildings just a fad? I think it would be even better as a co-working facility especially if it was

  1. completely recycled
  2. outfitted by the co-workers

    3. .

More from the WebUrbanist.

Related posts:

  1. Co-Working guidelines.
  2. 3D printable versus Net Censorship
  3. Workplaces
  4. Coworking Microsupport

Coworking Microsupport

Microfinance see Microcredit. –noun the lending of very small amounts of money at low interest, esp. to a start-up company or self-employed person. The problem with Microfinance and Microcredit is that, at the end of the day, someone ends up owing someone else money. And that’s a shaky way to get started in anything. The … Continue reading “Coworking Microsupport”

Microfinance

see Microcredit. –noun
the lending of very small amounts of money at low interest, esp. to a start-up company or self-employed person.

The problem with Microfinance and Microcredit is that, at the end of the day, someone ends up owing someone else money. And that’s a shaky way to get started in anything.

The concept of Microfinance for small businesses in return for equity in the business has already been successfully applied via Paul Graham’s Ycombinator.

Y Combinator does seed funding for startups. Seed funding is the earliest stage of venture funding. It pays your expenses while you’re getting started.
We make small investments (rarely more than $20,000) in return for small stakes in the companies we fund (usually 2-10%).
What happens at Y Combinator? The most important thing we do is work with startups on their ideas. We’re hackers ourselves, and we’ve spent a lot of time figuring out how to make things people want. So we can usually see fairly quickly the direction in which a small idea should be expanded, or the point at which to begin attacking a large but vague one.

This seems to me to be a different slant on the pre-Bubble concept of ‘code for pizza’. I knew a couple of smart guys back pre-2000 who worked full time for companies in return for pizza and promises while in receipt of unemployment benefit – they were doing the right thing after all – making a real concerted effort to get off the unemployment line by trying to be employable. None of them are gazillionaires right now (which shows the benefits of contracts over promises).

While Northern Ireland has had the concept of the incubator for years (the first one I visited was the Fujitsu/University of Ulster funded incubator where I met the guys who were ‘Osarius’ who have now all moved on to bigger and better things), it was definitely in a larger scale. There were desks, offices, stationery. That’s not the sector I’m interested in.

With the work being done for the co-working space in Northern Ireland, it is my intent to fund a desk or two and provide some desktop computers (intel iMacs) in order to foster some idea of Microsupport for potential startup companies. It’s not about funding their pizza or foozball lifestyles because people who want to get things done will find a way – this is operational expenditure. The hard part for this sector is the capital expenditure. By providing up to date hardware and taking advantage of the bountiful free time that ‘young people’ have, I think there could be an excellent environment created in the co-working space to foster new and cool innovations coming out of Belfast. David Rice wrote that the co-working initiative is designed to espouse this single concept:

Bringing silicon valley thinking to Belfast by creating a cutting edge work space for digital and creative workers.

It’s my aim that one of the rooms in the upstairs be allocated to ‘incubation’ for a few potential movers and shakers out there who need that extra bit of support to get started. I don’t care whether they want to become movie makers, software engineers, web developers or digital artists – as long as they don’t just sit around surfing the web, it’s got to be better than nothing. I’ve not really talked about this with David, Andy or anyone else central to CoworkingBelfast so they may throw their hands up and tell me to piss off – but this is the concept. Most of the individuals involved in CoWorking Belfast are young men who probably would have loved to have a co-working space available to them especially with some up to date hardware starting up.

What would Co-Working Belfast get out of it? Another raison d’etre. Karma. Kudos. Reputation. And the feeling of doing the right thing. Maybe if they’re a success they’ll help fund the next iteration of CoWorking Belfast or whatever the new fad of the day is.

There are other similar methods of support out there which have a similar model but are not the same and therefore I think this brings a certain uniqueness. For example, Google’s Summer of Code provides a $5000 stipend for student developers for summer (around 3 months) of work on open source projects. Google funds around 400 students each summer this way (putting the bill at around $2 million) but then they are Google and have infinite money. There are also business incubation services in Northern Ireland available through InvestNI but the pitch is for the slightly later stage when the individuals know what they’re doing and need the incubation from hatchling to maturity.

To extend the metaphor, I’m talking about supporting the egg itself – until the egg cracks. It’s never been easier to start up a business and become the next Twitter, Youtube, Big Word Project or 37Signals and it is these kinds of business that we should be fostering. I think that the people involved in starting the co-working space in Belfast are best qualified to determine who uses the ‘hatchery’.

The co-working space itself won’t make Belfast like Silicon Valley by it’s presence, but by it’s vision.

Related posts:

  1. The State of Funding in 2009 in Northern Ireland
  2. The Broadband Blueprint (re DETI Telecoms Consultation)
  3. Co-Working
  4. CoWorking: profit or non-profit

Belfast OpenCoffeeClub

The Belfast Open Coffee Club met tonight and managed to pull in more people than ever – twenty or so – and I was both pleased and disappointed that there are just too many smart, interesting people in the room and not enough time to talk to them all. If I didn’t say hello to … Continue reading “Belfast OpenCoffeeClub”

The Belfast Open Coffee Club met tonight and managed to pull in more people than ever – twenty or so – and I was both pleased and disappointed that there are just too many smart, interesting people in the room and not enough time to talk to them all. If I didn’t say hello to you directly, then I apologise. There were some people I wanted to grill mercilessly but I didn’t even get a chance to say Hello. You know who you are.

16:30 – Co-Working Belfast
A 20 minute walkaround the site puts some reality on the bones of what we’ve been thinking about. I’m liking what I saw in our review of the site (and I’ll post the recording video of our walkaround if people want to see it to get a feel for the site – it’s a 5 minute 58 MB .mp4 file and I’ve added a Youtube embed below which will give you a BlairWitch-esque view of the building). I’m pleased that we’ve got enough people to actually make this a going concern but the serious questions about what kind of support we will get from Belfast City Council and InvestNI are still unanswered.


5 minute YouTube video

The site itself needs a lot of work but it’s big enough for the purposes. There’s work that needs done ‘structurally’ in terms of the removal of a stud wall and the creation of some partition and there’s going to need to be significant investment in terms of equipment – desks, chairs, locks – never mind computing infrastructure. But, in the end, I like it.

That said – it’s not a site like some of the others we’ve seen – which have artistic ceilings and look more like art studios than workplaces. It’s going to be grassroots, it’s basic but it’s sustainable and provides what I’d consider to be a basis for future movement.

19:00 – OpenCoffee Club
There were too may clusters of people talking to allow me to cover them all here but the ones which I witnessed were:

  • Will King, Darryl Collins and David Braziel – talking about the integration of location-significant data. I saw some demos showing heatmaps of Flickr pics over Northern Ireland, crime statistics, wifi points and some neat ‘cluster’ widgets which allowed information to be collected in easily understood ways.
  • I spoke perhaps at length (and with a bit of spittle) about the purpose of the Belfast OpenCoffeeClub in the formation of Northern Ireland’s future progress in technology. I was, of course, preaching to the converted so I have to apologise to Russell and Lee who had to listen to me rant about what the future might hold and how it was vitally important for the grassroots organisations to present themselves sensibly and with direction to government in order to achieve change. The people in that room were , in effect, the Digital Circle. We had application designers for desktop, mobile and web, GIS specialists, creatives, movie makers, animators, musicians, wireless enthusiasts and, last and least, me.
  • Andy and I spoke for a few minutes about Co-Working Belfast and I do feel a little guilty about stealing the spotlight at times and speaking too much. It’s an area I’m incredibly passionate about and sometimes that enthusiasm is a little hard to contain. We received some encouraging remarks but I think there’s some more marketing and work required before we can say that CoWorking Belfast will be filled to capacity.
  • The subject of the OpenCoffeeClub BBQ was also discussed. Philip will be driving a 7 seater people carrier down and we have half a dozen people to go in it. Some people need to be back earlier than others but we shall work through that – the plan at the moment is to drive down on the Tuesday afternoon, stay over, attend the BBQ, then stay over again and leave first thing in the morning in order to get back for a decent hour (lunchtime). I’ll be organising accommodation tomorrow. Confirmed names for the car are: Philip, Matt, Andy, Damien, Stuart and Mairin. Will is also going down separately.
  • There were other discussions of potential TechLudd, CreativeCamp and other copies of events happening around the world. I think it’s great but it would also be nice to do something original. More on those as we get more information.

As 21:00 came, I had to leave due to family commitments but it was extremely encouraging to see so many people there and I’m sure that if circumstances has been different, we’d have seen half a dozen more.

Roll on next time!

Related posts:

  1. CreativeCamp Belfast
  2. BarCamp Belfast this coming Saturday!
  3. The Broadband Blueprint (re DETI Telecoms Consultation)
  4. Coworking Microsupport

Co-Working Office Design considerations.

Following on from my post aimed at making you think about what your co-working site would look like, here’s more on the design. What assumptions are you making with your co-working design? Are you making it open plan or cubicles? Are there going to be areas for privacy? LaunchPad, a co-working site due to open … Continue reading “Co-Working Office Design considerations.”

Following on from my post aimed at making you think about what your co-working site would look like, here’s more on the design. What assumptions are you making with your co-working design? Are you making it open plan or cubicles? Are there going to be areas for privacy?

LaunchPad, a co-working site due to open in Austin, TX this September are happily showing off their floorplans interestingly enough with some evolution of the design. You have to wonder at the ‘ceiling’ they have planned (in the 3D renders) and ask – if this enterprise was cost-dependent then why would they bother with something so artistic? The answer is to shield their eyes from the drab cubicles upstairs and yet still let natural light in from the skylights. It has a function! I think too often we ignore the ‘possible’ in favour of the ‘assumption’ because the ‘possible’ seems beyond our grasp. I think I might have favoured a white translucent canvas ‘dome’ if only for the home-made IMAX opportunities it may offer.

Via James’ blog, I was led to the Altrupreneur Centre Project where they debate the virtues of cubicle versus open office design based on the results of a study performed a few years back. The study concluded that open office design negatively impacted workers satisfaction and they find it ironic that Co-Working espouses the open office design.

The study itself sampled 21 employees who were in a large private organisation and were surveyed before the shift, 4 weeks after the move and again 6 months after. Employee satisfaction went down and, frankly I’m not surprised. The survey doesn’t prove anything about co-working, positively or negatively, it proves something about making changes in large entrenched organisations.

  • Moving desks is something that not a lot of people like doing. Moving your comfortable work environment and yet having to keep the detritus of your previous desk is difficult especially when you’ve just lost your cubicle walls.
  • Personal preference in seating matters to some people. I don’t care where I sit but I prefer having my back to a wall as opposed to a doorway. That’s a personal thing.
  • The view can matter. There’s always a debate here with desk moves because where we were sitting previously, there was a nice view over the Dock on one side and the long stretch of road towards Belfast on the other. Now, I can see warehouse roofs on one side and on the other, an office.
  • Breaking the status quo with a team can be damaging to morale. If everyone knows that Dave sits by the window because, frankly, he was first there then that’s fine. If there’s a move and someone new gets the window seat it’s unlikely to please anyone. Least of all Dave.
  • Privacy is important to some people especially depending on their work ethic and their ability to get into ‘the zone’ for being productive. If you’re easily distracted or like checking out web sites during your breaks, you might not like this new potential for people to interrupt you.
  • We have no data about whether this move was done voluntarily, whether the individuals were consulted beforehand, whether they volunteered or whether there were accommodations made to attempt to make their experience more palatable.

Co-Working does not equal Open Office Design but the sort of person likely to be attracted to co-working is not going to be someone who would naturally need privacy and peace to work. It’s going to attract more social people, people who have flexible management who trust them to get the work done, people who work for themselves and can discipline themselves.

In The Business Plan for the Co-Working space I planned to open, we considered the different needs of different individuals which is why there was seating planned for the ground floor which was a public coffee shop, the next floor would be an open plan co-work space (The Commons) and the floor above that would include offices for people to work together in relative privacy (The Cloisters). There should be a mix!

I mention this because Andy mentioned that it would be possible to come along and view the potential co-working space in Belfast at 4:30 pm today. Co-Working is certainly the buzzword for the moment.

Related posts:

  1. Co-Working 2008
  2. Workplaces
  3. A Physician completely refutes Plandemic
  4. What does your (ideal) co-working office look like?

What does your (ideal) co-working office look like?

The look and feel of a co-working space is going to make or break it. Does it have a clean, sterile aesthetic? Or does it feel like you’re in a house, natty carpet, curtains, sofas with patterned throws? Or does it look like a busy office with multiple low level cubicles? What I may see … Continue reading “What does your (ideal) co-working office look like?”

The look and feel of a co-working space is going to make or break it. Does it have a clean, sterile aesthetic? Or does it feel like you’re in a house, natty carpet, curtains, sofas with patterned throws? Or does it look like a busy office with multiple low level cubicles? What I may see as my perfect co-working space may not be ideal for others. Some people need space, others enjoy being crowded, some prefer the noise of a coffee shop, others want something more private.

This is a nice co-working space – copied from the NotAnMBA blog – showing a cool concept for Co-Working. Of course, this is absolutely form over function, style over utility. The office layout is originally designed by Adam Kalkin, pictured at http://www.thecoolhunter.net/design/ (site very slow):

It’s clinical, it’s striking, it would cost a fortune. The costs of desks and office chairs has to be considered (never mind the lorry crates used to make offices in the picture above.

What do people expect from a Co-Working site?

This? An image taken from Wired of the Jelly Co-Working:


It just seems untidy and maybe not the best work environment – not to mention what it would do for your posture.

Personally I want something in the middle. I would prefer a sofa there for conversations but there need to be several workstations, places for people to work. Would there need to be a ‘do not disturb’ sign so that if you’re in the zone the guy next to you doesn’t keep talking about his weekend. I think a blog posts covering ‘co-working manners’ would be pencilled in for next week!

Something like this interests me.

The reality we have to remember is that in any new co-working space, unless there’s some external funding, you’re going to want to pack them in. You’re not going to have the luxury of large rooms and extravagant space between desks.

Related posts:

  1. Workplaces
  2. Co-Working guidelines.
  3. Co-Working 2008
  4. Co-Working Office Design considerations.

Co-Working 2008

Pat Phelan writes about Co-Working in Cork: so if you could get 20 people to invest €25 per week, co working should be incredibly simple plus €50 from each to start-up ?? It really requires people who are passionate about it to start to put their money where their mouth is. I’ve spoken a lot … Continue reading “Co-Working 2008”

Pat Phelan writes about Co-Working in Cork:

so if you could get 20 people to invest €25 per week, co working should be incredibly simple plus €50 from each to start-up ??

It really requires people who are passionate about it to start to put their money where their mouth is.

I’ve spoken a lot about co-working in the past in conjunction with ‘Bedouin‘ working. Though it’s not something I could really take advantage of right now (due to the day job requirements and my partner working nights), it remains something I would support with my money as well as my mouth.

Looking at the costs though – and assuming £20 a week for Belfast:

20 people at £20 a week is £19200 a year if you assume 48-week occupancy. I did a quick search on Propertynews Commercial this morning targetting the City Centre, Botanic, Stranmillis and the University Area.

For £7000 pa (plus same again in Rates), you can get 1000 sq ft in a second floor suite on Shaftesbury Square. For £9000 pa (and again about the same in Rates), you can get the ground floor of a house on University Street (with 711 sq ft). For £13500 a year (plus a massive cost in rates), you can get about 1800 sq ft in Rosemary Street (just off Royal Avenue). These start to make the costs a lot higher but consider the crush in trying to fit 20 people into even 1800 sq ft when you consider that you are going to want desks, maybe even some sofas, breakout space, maybe even a conference room/meeting room or two. This is meant to be a relaxed place to work – not a sweatshop.

One of the most promising premises in terms of size is one on North Street which has 2300 sq ft already subdivided into offices and meeting rooms. The list price, £30 000 annually is high and the rates add another £10 000 onto the total. But the shape is wrong (with it divided into a host of one-man offices) and with the cost now hitting £40 000 (though a good negotiator could get that rent cut down to half), you’d have to charge people a lot more just to get in the door and that then doesn’t count operational or capital expenditure – desks, chairs, carpets, projectors, internet, telephones.

Nor does anything here take into account the necessity for 5-15 year leases.

I am convinced that running a Co-Working site needs to be a full time job for someone and, as a result, they’d need to get paid for it. Someone to keep the place clean, someone to make sure the bills get paid, to make sure the milk is fresh, to restock the coffee and to scrub the toilet bowl. Sure, this can be done by the co-workers themselves but I remain unconvinced that people will do it unless it is their job. It will always be someone else’s job.

And I also think there needs to be a retail element of it. You need to increase revenue by bringing in people off the street. No sense in buying decent coffee if it’s just going to be drunk by the people who turn up to the co-working space.

[UPDATE: from the comments, Co-working spaces need some definition. This graphic is taken from my 2006 business plan.

The NewWorkSpace aimed to fill in the gap. Coffee shop on the ground floor with normal coffee tables in the middle and ‘work booths’ around the edges. Stairway leading to reception and entry to the co-working floor – large tables, room for 2-5 people at each, sofas, kitchen. Office manager pay-for facilities here too like fax, printer. Door leading to offices on next floor and secure storage for members. There was a lot more visual detail which I’ll lead someone though if they ask.]

Related posts:

  1. Co-Working Office Design considerations.
  2. Workplaces
  3. Co-Working guidelines.
  4. Co-Working

Recession coming, solution = Entrepreneurship

John F. Kennedy writes about the recession of the Irish economy Enterprise and entrepreneurship are the antidote for unemployment and recession. Encourage people to use computers and broadband to beat the recession, they can work for anyone from anywhere. They can create businesses based on anything from selling stuff on eBay to using their intelligence … Continue reading “Recession coming, solution = Entrepreneurship”

John F. Kennedy writes about the recession of the Irish economy

Enterprise and entrepreneurship are the antidote for unemployment and recession. Encourage people to use computers and broadband to beat the recession, they can work for anyone from anywhere. They can create businesses based on anything from selling stuff on eBay to using their intelligence to write, provide consultancy services or develop technology. This is the way out. Failure to provide them with the tools is economic sabotage. Let’s hope intelligence prevails.

Yes!

This sort of thinking is what Momentum and the Digital Circle[1] should be working on. It’s not necessarily about supporting the existing economy but by providing grass roots access to technology to take advantage of nascent knowledge workers.

I just don’t see us taking advantage of it. And we’d have to work hard to create value in this ‘credit crunch restricted’ world. That said, while the property market is in the doldrums, there are investors with cash in their portfolios looking for technologies to invest in.

To this end we need strategies like Co-Working Belfast or my as-yet-stillborn New Workspace to provide the most basic substrate for people to find places to work and collaborate. Just getting the space organised would make a big step – the rest is then up to the individuals with experienced mentors providing the introductions. How about a system of half a dozen mini-Ycombinators?

Anyway. You’re a taxpayer. Think about it.

[1] For a laugh, see digitalcircle.org without the www. Anyone see a problem?

Related posts:

  1. Digital Circle going independent and my thoughts on the Future
  2. The Broadband Blueprint (re DETI Telecoms Consultation)
  3. Workplaces
  4. Entrepreneurship

Workplaces

I’ve never made secret my love of the concepts of ‘Going Bedouin’ or ‘Co-Working’. The difference between them is simple. Going Bedouin The principle of having your entire business on your back. Today you work in a coffee shop on Royal Avenue, tomorrow a coffee shop in Bradbury Place. And with 3G USB doohickeys being … Continue reading “Workplaces”

I’ve never made secret my love of the concepts of ‘Going Bedouin’ or ‘Co-Working’.

The difference between them is simple.

Going Bedouin

The principle of having your entire business on your back. Today you work in a coffee shop on Royal Avenue, tomorrow a coffee shop in Bradbury Place. And with 3G USB doohickeys being so cheap these days it seems that you don’t even need to find a WiFi-enabled cafe. Going Bedouin is going to be best for someone who has a relatively paper-free business due to the lack of printing facilities and they’d also be likely to stock up on extra batteries just in case their workplace of the day doesn’t have any convenient power points. Your expenses are going to be the amount of food and beverages that the coffee shop owner will expect you to buy in order to retain your seat. Some Bedouin workers have scorned the idea of ‘paying your way’ but it is an important part of the economy. If you don’t like it, shack up in a corner of the bus station or in another public space.

Co-Working

For the most part, this is about hiring a desk in a shared space. This is different to hiring a serviced office and sitting hidden in there knowing that the guy in the next office is working on something different. Shared spaces are all about getting the benefits of being in a busy office with less of the negatives. Candidates for co-working tend to be social people, people not irritated by the presence of others and people who might have worked for a big company before and missed the interaction at the water cooler or the photocopier when they went independent. Most co-workers will only use the shared space part-time due to other pressures in their lives. The Co-Work space should therefore be something of a refuge and it’s not conducive to have stressed-out, under-pressure individuals in your space (unless watching someone slowly implode really relaxes you). Co-Working is about relationships more than anything.

Excellence in workspace

An important point in changing your workstyle to add in Bedouin working or Co-Working is to make sure it provides an improvement.

The space you choose should fit in with the pattern of how you want to work. If you like working early in the morning or late at night, you’ll need to consider this (most half decent cafes in Belfast seem to close at 6). Consider your transport routes and, more importantly, your footwear. Consider that you may need to bring a coat of some sort even when the weather seems fine (and a warm sweater if you’re in Ireland).

For a Co-Working space, look at the other co-workers and make an attempt to be friends with them. Is the space tidy or well-kept? Do they have insurance? Or Alarm systems? What’s to stop someone walking in off the street? Do you feel comfortable leaving your equipment and content unattended? Do they have a lockup for your stuff when you’re out of the office? What ‘virtual office’ facilities do they have? Fax? Telephone? Receptionist? Do they have a kitchen? What about a breakout area for chat? Do the other co-workers have any odious habits? Does it smell fresh? Are the windows open? Is the carpet clean?

And when it’s restroom time – do you pack up your mobile office into your bag and disappear into the restroom to emerge later smelling faintly of cheap liquid soap? Do you leave it all out and hope that someone will look after your stuff?

Co-Working is all about relationships – do you trust these people?

Prerequisites

The first and most important element in considering Bedouin or CoWorking plans is whether or not you can make money – some businesses lend themselves naturally, while some do not. Services like Twitter give you a skewed perspective of work because there’s little visibility of time zones, business models and segregation. While you’re making your decisions, you can see that some people are re-installing their gaming machines or going for a walk, sitting in a coffee house drinking Americanos, giving talks or drumming in the park. You don’t see the work that they do because you’re always being updated by someone.

Another element that people don’t consider is outsourcing work that doesn’t bring direct value. Hire an accountant. Make sure your mail host and file server host are reliable. Make sure you have a reliable communications network with others in your team (if you are part of a team) because your team will need that interaction with you.

Ask yourself why you want to change your workstyle. Coffee is cheaper at home. Peace and quiet probably more achievable (unless there are kids involved). Talk through it with your partner at home as they may resent you changing from being a teleworker-at-home to a teleworker-in-cafe.

If you’re doing it, embrace it. Make the most of it and don’t be a wallflower.

Next Steps

I plan to talk more about possibilities in Co-Working over the next few days. I don’t know how much of my vision concurs with the vision of the individuals who make up the Co-Working Belfast group because I have some very specific ideas of what I want to see. I still have this business plan for ‘the new workspace’ which I wrote in 2006 and I think it deserves another crack of the whip.

Related posts:

  1. Co-Working 2008
  2. Taking Bedouin to the illogical extreme
  3. Bedou-working…
  4. Co-Working Office Design considerations.