Re: [Coworking] Re: My morbid curiosity with Coworking Space Closings

[Will Bennis, Locus Workspace]

Thank you so much for this feedback, Steve. Really cool to hear about your 
influences and experiences with my father's writing. He was actually 
sitting in the back of the room at a long-ago small coworking conference 
that you were at, I think the only time I met you in person (a meeting at 
Blankspaces in Santa Monica for coworking space owners who had been in 
business for a year or more, maybe in 2012 or so). He kind of just wanted 
to sneak in and see what his son was working on, but was truly inspired by 
the optimism and willingness to openly collaborate among a roomful of 
competitors. I know you're in most many ways the same kind of observer, but 
thought you'd be interested to know.

On Sunday, February 11, 2018 at 6:38:59 PM UTC+1, Steve King wrote:
>
> Will: Excellent essay that I enjoyed on several levels. First, your 
> father's work had a major impact on my career. I was slugging it out 
> climbing the corporate ladder in the late 80's and 90's. On Becoming a 
> Leader and his other work greatly helped me shift from being a front line 
> manager to an exec. In particular, his work made me understands the 
> importance of  developing and communicating what George Bush senior called 
> "the vision thing".  I was also fortunate enough to hear your father speak 
> several times. He was very inspiring. 
>
> Second, in our work advising startups we often find startup CEO's and 
> other execs struggle making the shift from working for the company to on 
> the company. This is a very hard transition - especially for founders - and 
> many fail because of their inability to do so.
>
> And I also agree with your points on the importance of environment and its 
> importance to independent workers. 
>
> Good luck with the new location.
>
> Steve
>
>
> On Saturday, February 10, 2018 at 5:42:37 AM UTC-8, Will Bennis, Locus 
> Workspace wrote:
>>
>> Finally finished the final post 
>> 
>>  
>> in a long promised three part series about closing a branch of my coworking 
>> space.
>>
>> It's about the *optimism *that can come from scaling down, about 
>> overcoming the entrepreneur's central challenge of transitioning from 
>> "working for your company to working on your company" (from *maintaining 
>> *your business *to developing *it), about the role of external context 
>> in work success, and a tribute to my father (who was a pioneer in 
>> leadership studies and who passed away in 2014).
>>
>> Would love to hear others' thoughts, as I think it has a lot to do with 
>> common challenges we all face, and not much to do with my particular 
>> coworking space!
>>
>> On Tuesday, August 1, 2017 at 6:10:23 PM UTC+2, Alex Hillman wrote:
>>>
>>> Thanks for sharing this, Will. Part two, about relief 
>>> ,
>>>  was 
>>> especially resonant for me!
>>>
>>> Seems bittersweet - excited to read part three about optimism :)
>>>
>>>
>>> --
>>> *The #1 mistake in community building is doing it by yourself.*
>>> Better Coworkers: http://indyhall.org
>>> Weekly Coworking Tips: http://coworkingweekly.com
>>> My Audiobook: https://theindyhallway.com/ten
>>>
>>> On Sun, Jul 30, 2017 at 7:54 AM, Will Bennis, Locus Workspace <
>>> wi...@locusworkspace.com> wrote:
>>>
 Just adding to this thread to announce another coworking space closing 
 (Locus Workspace's first location in Prague, Czech Republic). We're not 
 out 
 of business, just consolidating from two to one space. And ultimately it 
 was a great thing. But it was our first location and really a difficult 
 choice to make. Anyway, here's a blog post about the sadness that came 
 with closing the space 
 .
  
 Running that space was a really important part of my life, and much of it 
 would not have been possible without the inspiration, ideas, and general 
 good will that came from this group.

 Best,
 Will 


 On Monday, February 9, 2015 at 8:32:37 AM UTC+1, OphelieR wrote:
>
> Thanks Andy for sharing these data. In our coworking the trend is a 
> bit different. 
>
> The average churn rate is 5% on all our memberships except the full 
> time coworking (different from resident/dedicated desk) which has a churn 
> rate of 8%. We don't have data around the main reason for living, it's 
> something we're putting in place at the moment but basically if someone 
> cancel from full time coworking it doesn't necessarily mean they will 
> upgrade to resident desk or downgrade to part time.
>
> Moreover, the number of full time coworker is much lower compare to 
> our resident members or part time coworkers. I was discussing this with 
> another coworking space owner at the GCUC in Bali last week and they had 
>

Re: [Coworking] Re: My morbid curiosity with Coworking Space Closings

[Steve King]

Will: Excellent essay that I enjoyed on several levels. First, your 
father's work had a major impact on my career. I was slugging it out 
climbing the corporate ladder in the late 80's and 90's. On Becoming a 
Leader and his other work greatly helped me shift from being a front line 
manager to an exec. In particular, his work made me understands the 
importance of  developing and communicating what George Bush senior called 
"the vision thing".  I was also fortunate enough to hear your father speak 
several times. He was very inspiring. 

Second, in our work advising startups we often find startup CEO's and other 
execs struggle making the shift from working for the company to on the 
company. This is a very hard transition - especially for founders - and 
many fail because of their inability to do so.

And I also agree with your points on the importance of environment and its 
importance to independent workers. 

Good luck with the new location.

Steve


On Saturday, February 10, 2018 at 5:42:37 AM UTC-8, Will Bennis, Locus 
Workspace wrote:
>
> Finally finished the final post 
>  
> in a long promised three part series about closing a branch of my coworking 
> space.
>
> It's about the *optimism *that can come from scaling down, about 
> overcoming the entrepreneur's central challenge of transitioning from 
> "working for your company to working on your company" (from *maintaining 
> *your 
> business *to developing *it), about the role of external context in work 
> success, and a tribute to my father (who was a pioneer in leadership 
> studies and who passed away in 2014).
>
> Would love to hear others' thoughts, as I think it has a lot to do with 
> common challenges we all face, and not much to do with my particular 
> coworking space!
>
> On Tuesday, August 1, 2017 at 6:10:23 PM UTC+2, Alex Hillman wrote:
>>
>> Thanks for sharing this, Will. Part two, about relief 
>> ,
>>  was 
>> especially resonant for me!
>>
>> Seems bittersweet - excited to read part three about optimism :)
>>
>>
>> --
>> *The #1 mistake in community building is doing it by yourself.*
>> Better Coworkers: http://indyhall.org
>> Weekly Coworking Tips: http://coworkingweekly.com
>> My Audiobook: https://theindyhallway.com/ten
>>
>> On Sun, Jul 30, 2017 at 7:54 AM, Will Bennis, Locus Workspace <
>> wi...@locusworkspace.com> wrote:
>>
>>> Just adding to this thread to announce another coworking space closing 
>>> (Locus Workspace's first location in Prague, Czech Republic). We're not out 
>>> of business, just consolidating from two to one space. And ultimately it 
>>> was a great thing. But it was our first location and really a difficult 
>>> choice to make. Anyway, here's a blog post about the sadness that came 
>>> with closing the space 
>>> .
>>>  
>>> Running that space was a really important part of my life, and much of it 
>>> would not have been possible without the inspiration, ideas, and general 
>>> good will that came from this group.
>>>
>>> Best,
>>> Will 
>>>
>>>
>>> On Monday, February 9, 2015 at 8:32:37 AM UTC+1, OphelieR wrote:

 Thanks Andy for sharing these data. In our coworking the trend is a bit 
 different. 

 The average churn rate is 5% on all our memberships except the full 
 time coworking (different from resident/dedicated desk) which has a churn 
 rate of 8%. We don't have data around the main reason for living, it's 
 something we're putting in place at the moment but basically if someone 
 cancel from full time coworking it doesn't necessarily mean they will 
 upgrade to resident desk or downgrade to part time.

 Moreover, the number of full time coworker is much lower compare to our 
 resident members or part time coworkers. I was discussing this with 
 another 
 coworking space owner at the GCUC in Bali last week and they had a similar 
 issues. 

 Is it something other coworking spaces are experiencing with full time 
 coworker ? Does anyone have any explanation for this ?


 On Wednesday, September 19, 2012 at 10:14:37 AM UTC+8, Alex Hillman 
 wrote:
>
> I'm sure I'm not the only person on this group who has google alerts 
> set up for the words "coworking" and, sigh, "co-working". 
>
> Between the number of new space announcements that show up in those 
> alerts, Deskmag's reporting on coworking growth trends, and many amazing 
> success stories that we've all been privy to seeing unfold, there's no 
> doubt in any of our minds that coworking isn't disappearing any time soon.
>
> But speckled in the success stories are sadder ones. Coworking spaces 
> who struggled and failed. 
>
> Another one hit my Google Re

[Coworking] Re: Co-working space onboarded direct competitor

[Miroslav Miroslavov]

As a member of a coworking space, startup founder and working with hundreds 
of coworking spaces, I would add that one of the key features of a 
coworking space is to:

   1. Make you feel that you belong to a community. *A place where you are 
   safe*!
   2. *Help you grow* your business by removing barriers. 
   3. Help you *find opportunities*.

The community managers should be the biggest *evangelist* of your business.

In my opinion, bringing direct competitor without speaking with the member 
first, is a violation of all points. In case the member agrees that 
actually, having the competitor will be fine and even it might open doors 
and create opportunities, then it's all good. 
Otherwise, if this breaks the safety zone and even may reduce the 
opportunities for the member, then it's surely not OK.

@Ivo, if I was you, I would probably leave and give them direct feedback 
that they should consider a better community service. 

On Friday, February 2, 2018 at 8:40:01 PM UTC+11, Ivo wrote:
>
> Hi all,
>
> Our startup team has been a member of a co-working space in central London 
> for a year.
> Our ambition has always been to build up a team there, be a member of a 
> community, and have a longer-term recognised place for our company.
>
> Now, the co-working space has on-boarded a direct competitor into the 
> community.
> Their response is they will not do anything about it.
>
> It makes our situation unmanageable:
> 1. We cannot discuss our work in the co-working space and the community 
> anymore.
> 2. Our team cannot engage with the community (which is a perk for people 
> joining a startup team)
> 3. Our investors and partners raise serious questions about the situation.
>
> The current situation cannot hold and will force us to leave if nothing 
> changes.
>
> In our view, this situation is very unfair.
> Our team has done nothing wrong and because of an error by the co-working 
> team, we are forced out.
>
> Does anyone have an idea how to go about this?
>
> Any help would be greatly appreciated.
>
> Thank you.
> Ivo
>
>
>
>  
>

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