Coworking isn’t the same as co-working.
70% of indy workers struggle with feeling isolated. 2019 will be the year of small experiments and interventions to help our community tackle that.
I’ve been doing a lot of reading around mental wellbeing within the independent workers communities (there are lots of communities of independent workers, it’s not a single community: tradespeople, journalists, actors, uber drivers, healthcare workers, cleaners, and increasingly many marketing folk, the community i’m aligned with — truth be told, it’s a diaspora connected via working style, rather than a community at all).
Using coworking spaces often comes up as a suggestion to tackle isolation — and in theory, it could help, if it was used properly — but the simple act of sitting with people is not enough for many. Being in the same physical space, or indeed even being around other people, isn’t the same as making a meaningful connection or valuable interaction.
Coworking Spaces are … in the main, ‘nearworking’ spaces. You’re working near other people also working. They’re often a collection of lots of people who happen to be working in the same space, rather than any real co-(connection, collaboration, cooperation, come here i’ll make you a cuppa)-type behaviours.
The space you work in rarely the answer — it’s the behaviours in that space that matter.
I think it’s time for coworking in a new sense. Where groups of people come together to genuinely work together, to share ideas and help each other out, without any expectation that they’ll have a better outcome in some way.
Imagine every Tuesday morning, in your beloved (co)working space, at the kitchen table in one of your (co)lleagues homes, a (co)mmunity centre, or the classic (co)ffee shop [i’m totally owning adding co- to coffee], and you spend just 30 minutes talking about what you’re doing. Sharing the work you’ve done, that you’re planning on doing, speaking out loud and articulating what you’re up to. And then you listen back. You don’t even need to give or ask for advice — but if its welcomed, go for it.
That’s co-working.
In 2019, I’m going to open up my diary once a week (more where and when possible) for people to cowork alongside me, and i’d love to see others do the same.
Do we need a hashtag for saying when we’re open for business?
