What Makes A Coworking Space Effective?

Coworking has increased in popularity over the past few years, not just in the USA but also in the UK. Coworking spaces like ours are the breeding ground for productivity and are the perfect environment for everyone from freelancers to musicians, from startups to fully fledged entrepreneurs. A coworking space is a creative hub for individuals.

Layout

The layout of the coworking space should be spacious to allow people to move and sit where they want. Partitions, although required for some businesses, should not be used too much as it feels like your boxed in like a normal cubicle office.. The aim of a coworking space is to be the opposite end of the spectrum, to allow others to feel free, informal and not under pressure in their working environment. We have recently removed partitions (you can see in the image) and the difference in the atmosphere is phenomenal.

Community

Coworking spaces are generally a recipe for success, but for it to work effectively there must be a community spirit. A coworking space isn’t just an informal, stress-free environment, they are also hubs for networking, growing friendships and learning new things from each-other. There must be a chill out area for your members to mingle and even events to bring the shy ones out of their shell. Monthly events help break coworking from the boring office stigma, so try to organise some social events or even some educational events to include your members and the local community. After all, you never know who you could introduce your coworkers to.

Technology

Although most coworking spaces do not supply laptops or computers for their members, the technology they do supply shouldn’t be shoddy. Things like fast and reliable WiFi are a must, as well as at least a printer and scanner. All technology should be able to keep up with the maximum number of members, ie the WiFi should not be super fast will 10 members but slow with 30 members in the office, it must be consistently quick.

Natural Light And Decor

This is an absolute necessity to incorporate the feeling of freedom into a coworking space. If your office has shutters and curtains shut with fluorescent lights then your coworkers won’t feel as relaxed. Let in some natural light from outside. Light and airy rooms encourage creativity whereas a dark room will un-motivate people (especially if it’s sunny outside) In our office we have big Victorian windows across two walls as well as brightly painted walls to create the feel of a bigger space.

Functional Furniture

Choice of furniture is more important in a coworking space than it is in a corporate office. The reason being, in a corporate office the employees are not usually expected to collaborate with eachother and so chairs are often big and bulky and cannot move, or people are event sat separately. In a coworking space you need chairs that are easy to move around the office, turn around and having flat clear tables with little or nothing on them. This allows for better collaboration between members as there are no distractions on a desk and they can easily move around in their chairs.

Keep It Simple

A coworking space should never be cluttered with things and have distracting pictures or wallpaper anywhere. Keep the whole style of the office as simple as you can, along with the natural light it increases the feeling of space as well as decreasing the chance of distraction of your members.

Unique

Each coworking space has it’s own style that makes it unique, all you need to do is find yours. Incorporate your brand’s colors into your color scheme, this has worked well for us and we often get comments about our lime green walls (Just in case you’re wondering, the Hulk had an accident). Who is your coworking space aimed at? There’s no way to please everyone so focus on a particular demographic and create the best coworking space for them. Is your coworking space more for creatives, fully fledged entrepreneurs or for freelancers?

So there you have it, a couple of ways to make a coworking space work effective. When done right, coworking has endless possibilities due to the different types of people mingling and possibly becoming the next Richard Branson, Steve Jobs or Mark Zuckerberg. It’s a great feeling watching people collaborating and creating something amazing.