Thanks for the heads up Tony and for your thought provoking response Mike. Mike, you're in Seattle tomorrow, correct? Looking forward to that beer.
Jacob --- Office Nomads - Individuality without Isolation http://www.officenomads.com - (206) 323-6500 On Tue, Jul 6, 2010 at 2:47 PM, mark gilbreath <[email protected]>wrote: > Kudos indeed to Elizabeth and her team. > > On the topic of engaging sponsors (ie other large established > organizations) behind coworking facilities and the community as a whole.... > this is a realistic objective and something that individual facility owners > and the community as a whole should aspire for. > > Many of the underlying tenets of the coworking movement (the increasing > mobility of work, sustainability, energy conservation, economic development, > economic efficiency) are consistent with the values and strategic > directions of large organizations, both public and private. The > challenge/trick is to frame the relationship with a partner entity in such a > way that it reinforces what they want to talk about to their market > audience. Think of your community as an ecosystem. Visualize your > coworking operation at the center of this ecosystem and consider who your > members are... freelancers, consultants, startup companies, non-profits... > the seeds of the future pillars of your business community. Now imagine > orbiting around you: > - local/regional economic development organizations (such as chamber of > commerce, state econ dev board etc) - they want to lower the barrier for the > formation of more new companies... they can be a partner. > - your local elected official (mayor, councilman, congressman) - they > are looking to support any initiative that results in the creation of > jobs... they can be a partner. > - your technology provider... companies like IBM, Cisco, Google, MSFT are > all espousing the concepts of smart work, mobile work, connected work... > look at your technology provider list... they can be partners. > - your local power company... in our local community, Idaho Power got > behind our project because we created a smart green space that used less > energy. they became a partner > - your members... you are helping your members get connected...you are > enabling their success... they are your partners > > So what can "partnership" mean? Well in our case, in the above examples it > meant such things as, co-marketing, press releases, case studies, sharing in > the promotion of special events, special pricing on goods and services for > us and our members, scholarship grants to subsidize memberships. > > Bit of a ramble here when i should be working...apologies. I can polish > this up with a more complete and thoughtful post if this is of interest to > anyone. > > Best > Mark > On Tue, Jul 6, 2010 at 1:42 PM, Tony Bacigalupo > <[email protected]>wrote: > >> Hey hey everyone, >> >> TechCrunch just wrote up about Google funding TechHub in London... they >> even used the word "co-working" in the lead paragraph: >> http://eu.techcrunch.com/2010/07/06/first-pearson-now-google-sponsors-londons-techhub-for-startups/ >> >> This might be pretty big news for us. I've copied Elizabeth here in the >> hopes that perhaps she'll jump on and share some thoughts with us on the >> backstory behind it! >> >> NWC is doing some deep exploration of the ways sponsors could get involved >> in a coworking space in a way that augments and reinforces, and doesn't >> detract from, the community... so any thoughts on best practices when it >> comes to lining up good sponsors are welcome. >> >> Congrats to TechHub; looking forward to learning more! >> >> Cheers, >> Tony >> >> ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- >> New Work City - Lowering barriers to working for yourself. >> Web: http://nwcny.com >> Blog: http://nwc2.tumblr.com >> Twitter: http://twitter.com/nwc >> Phone: (347) 559-1437 >> Address: 394 Broadway, Fifth Floor >> >> >> >> >> >> -- >> You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups >> "Coworking" group. >> To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. >> To unsubscribe from this group, send email to >> [email protected]<coworking%[email protected]> >> . >> For more options, visit this group at >> http://groups.google.com/group/coworking?hl=en. >> > > > > -- > Mark Gilbreath > > PO Box 2830 > Ketchum, ID 83340 > > mobile 208-720-8107 > skype mfgilbreath > twitter markgilbreath > > -- > You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups > "Coworking" group. > To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. > To unsubscribe from this group, send email to > [email protected]<coworking%[email protected]> > . > For more options, visit this group at > http://groups.google.com/group/coworking?hl=en. > -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Coworking" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/coworking?hl=en.
