It's tricky. I did it, but I had a partner. Without Susan, it would have
played out very differently. There are just so many layers that need your
attention that presence is required, not just physically, but mentally.
The first few years (or more) are figuring out your processes. Even if you
adopt those of others, you still need to wrap your mind around them. That
means every little thing, like buying paper towels for example, is also a
dozen other things like deciding where you buy your supplies? Do you pick
them up or have them delivered? Where do you store them? How much do you
buy? Do you want paper towels or cloth towels? And there are a million
little things so that adds up fast.
And operations things like that are an order of magnitude easier then the
REAL work of running a coworking space: being present for your members.
Sure when everything is running smoothly people get along and everyone
pitches in... but things don't always run smoothly. And when they don't,
it's your problem right then, right now, and odds are you are busy doing
something else for your full-time job. If someone wants you to hold their
hand setting up the printer, it doesn't really matter that you have a
deadline. If someone is having a rough day and needs someone to talk to,
you want to be there for them. It's important. If one member decides the
radio should be at a higher volume and another decides it needs to be at a
lower volume, it's in your best interest to negotiate that quickly and
quietly before it blows up in to something big. You might miss the signs
until it's too late if you have your head in your other job.
And all that is just keeping the lights on and people happy. You still
need to reach out to the larger community and bring people in. Lots to
think about. I'm most protective over the softer things as it's easy to
overlook and just hope for the best.
Jacob
On Thu, Dec 18, 2014 at 6:18 AM, Jason Phelps jpphe...@gmail.com wrote:
I currently work for a company remotely and spend my days at a coworking
space. I am looking at the option of starting my own coworking space to
meet a need in a particular location in town. I've read some stories of
others starting their own space while working fulltime, but those posts
were from 3+ years ago. Not to negate the value of experiences that are
old, I wanted to see if there's anyone that has done that recently and how
it impacted your ability to start your space.
The other aspect of this that is probably more difficult to predict or
control is profitability and the ability to actually do this full time. A
comment I found on this forum said regarding the time to make the jump to
doing coworking fulltime was it's a singular moment where you just know.
I wanted to hear from other owners here if it is possible to actually do
coworking fulltime, or if I should not even be thinking along those lines
and just focus on solving a need here in town and let it grow as it does.
I'm curious what others have seen in their experience.
I'll be doing some digging here and possibly even have some questions
around recommendations for management software, door locks, etc. But for
now, I'm honestly just open to hearing advice from those that have gone
down this road and learned lessons that I'd prefer not to learn the hard
way :-) Whether that's business partners, leasing vs. owning, etc., I'm
open to advise and wisdom from all the experts here.
I'm so glad I found this group - looking forward to reading and learning!
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