What is Coworking?

Coworking is a great concept that is increasingly gaining traction within the working community as more and more startup businesses emerge, complimented by many graduates who choose to work for themselves following freelance career pathways.

Traditionally, workers of this type would be relatively isolated, working either from their own homes or more recently from coffee shops and cafes due to the proliferation of free WiFi hotspots and widespread mobile broadband. This move out of the home and into the ‘public office' is indicative of the disadvantages that many freelancers experience when working from a location that they traditionally associate with relaxation or downtime.

Coworking is the natural progression of this concept into a unified space that offers all the advantages of a traditional office, whilst refraining from imposing any formal guidelines regarding expected ways of working. In the words of BusinessWeek it is where "the coffee shop meets the cubicle".

Many professionals new to coworking liken it to the ‘hot-desking' model which became popular in the 1980s, albeit with a fresh focus on social, collaborative and cooperative ideologies. With this in mind, most coworkers actually find that their main benefits are delivered by the contact they have with fellow users, as they are able to find a natural synergy alongside other talented individuals whose talents differ from, and compliment their own.

"Jeremy Pepper, a technology publicist who rents a desk at Sandbox Suites, said he often lends expertise in social media to a woman who works for a large corporation and rents a desk nearby."

 

Dan Fost, New York Times

The design of coworking spaces often helps foster these communities by bringing down the physical walls of the conventional office and instead constructing an open plan space with shared meeting areas, joint refreshment spaces, flexible partitions and movable desks.

"Though the buildings weren't designed with any community spaces (too expensive), Liddell found that tenants clamored for community anyway, using empty suites to throw wine and cheese parties."

 

Kerry Miller, BusinessWeek

As well as the notable collaborative benefits that come with working alongside those plying their trade in similar industries, coworkers appreciate that coworking gives them access to the latest technical facilities which they may otherwise struggle to fund the acquisition of if working from home.
In summary, coworking is an exciting emerging trend which is proven to offer unique advantages to the modern nomadic business professional seeking to maximise their productivity whilst not regressing to the archaic office environment of days gone by.