If you’re an entrepreneur or a remote worker, you may have visited or used a co-working space. Actually, it appears that people who use them do thrive more than people working in regular office spaces. From seeing their work as more meaningful to feeling part of a community and having more job control, people in co-working spaces just seem to derive more happiness and meaning from their work.
Here in Australia, where I live, which by the way is an amazing place to launch a business, co-working spaces are great places to build connections. It also helps that Aussies are warm, effusive, and highly dynamic. They work hard, take success seriously, and love to experiment with new ideas.These qualities make the country a very interesting place to network.
It is also the ideal environment for entrepreneurs who are keen to push the envelope and create something different. All you’ve got to do is step into the right workplace to find engaging debate, innovative strategies, and collaborative enterprise. In co-working spaces like Servcorp for instance in Sydney, for example, and you’ll be right at the heart of the corporate action.
This guide to making friends and securing big opportunities in your co-working space will give
you some advice on how to communicate.
Acknowledge the Space
While all the best coworking facilities contain a mixture of collaborative and more private
spaces, it’s important to maximise the value of shared endeavour. You don’t have to be
chatty and open to others all the time, but small businesses do stand to benefit greatly from
collective thinking, creating, and brainstorming. Even if you just have casual conversations
with fellow entrepreneurs, they’ll still teach you a lot about the market.
Respect the Space
On the other hand, it is just as important to respect privacy when it’s clearly warranted or
desired. This can be tricky at first, particularly if you’re not used to sharing an office, but it’s
just a matter of letting common sense guide you. Strike up conversations with new
acquaintances during slow moments like coffee breaks or when you’re both setting up your
equipment in the morning. Then, it’ll feel less intrusive if you drop in on them with a
suggestion, question, or recommendation later.
Suggest a Labour Exchange
This is one of the simplest ways to cement a new relationship in a coworking space. These
shared facilities welcome high-end clients from all kinds of industries and walks of life. It
means that, at any one time, they’re filled with a broad variety of skills and talents. You’re
bound to have one which somebody else does not and you can use this to strengthen a new
connection. For instance, you could offer advice on website development, in exchange for a
hand designing your new business cards.
Be a Helpful Colleague
It is a little sneaky, but you can gain exposure for your brand by making promotional items
easily available in the coworking space. Most facilities won’t take kindly to tenants leaving
merchandise strewn just anywhere, but having a supply of branded pens, erasers, and
mouse mats at your workstation are acceptable. You’ll quickly find that explicitly hawking
them is not necessary because almost everybody will need a spare pen or pencil at some
point.
Show Your Passionate Side
It is true that coworking spaces represent an opportunity to make potentially lucrative
connections, but they’re also a great environment for creative discussion. In a shared office,
business owners and freelancers are equal, so everybody is free to get openly passionate
about what they do and why they love it. Australians are energetic people and they value
straight talking, so be open to the idea of sharing not just the space but also your goals.
Why Coworking Spaces Are a Great Place to Learn
The idea that entrepreneurs should close themselves off to the rest of the market and only
view their rivals with a suspicious gaze is an old one. It doesn’t really apply to the modern
business world because so much of our technology is now based on collaboration.
Coworking spaces are wonderful learning environments, because they place young
entrepreneurs at the heart of the action, among other motivated, fast moving professionals.
Author Bio : Alexandra Richards is an Australian business consultant, located in Melbourne. She takes a keen interest in business structures and work culture. Recently she has taken a particular interest in the benefit of having virtual office solutions to attract clients in Asia.
To Your Success,
The Corporate Sis.
