Best of Both Worlds : The Coworking Phenomenon

Brad Neuberg, once a nomadic internet entrepreneur had no place to hang his hat in 2005 when he left a tech start-up to work for himself. While it’s popular opinion that the notion of leaving a firm to be your own boss and work from the comfort of your own home is one that closely resembles a fantasy dream come true, it’s an overlooked fact that there are some things that get lost in translation. Office camaraderie and meaningful social interactions were things Neuberg longed to keep, but lost in the isolation of a home office. De facto cafe workspaces were a band-aid at best.

So how could Neuberg have the best of both worlds; the freedom of working independent of a corporate workspace and the community of working within one?

Neuberg began instinctively gathering the bare essentials of a functioning work environment, wireless internet, folding tables, a space (courtesy of the delightfully bohemian Spiral Muse) and of course, the key ingredient, people – like-minded in their dual desire for both independence and structure. In doing so, Neuberg uncovered the simple solution to his dilemma: coworking; which sits in the comfortable niche of working together, but not quite.

The notion of coworking spaces was an attempt to gather freelance artists and professionals under the one roof to create the social stimulation a work environment thrives upon, but also maintain the autonomy enjoyed by independent workers. In essence, the work stays separate, but everything else bears the mark of a community. Thanks to it’s conception, creative entrepreneurs who have long since shaken off the corporate shackles finally have a place to call home.

As Rachel Botsman and Roo Rogers put it in their book What’s Mine is Yours: The Rise of Collaborative Consumption, ‘the spaces themselves vary in terms of perks and culture, but they are all based on combining the best elements of a coffee shop (social, energetic, creative) and the best elements of a workspace (productive, functional).’

Fast-forward half a decade and the idea has caught fire and become a global phenomenon. Coworking spaces have sprung up around the world including hubs being established in Australian cities such as Melbourne, Perth, Sydney and others. Our very own Vibewire Enterprise Hub in Sydney, Ultimo is of course one such example of a coworking space.

Lauren Anderson, ex co-ordinator of the Vibewire Enterprise Hub visited one other such coworking space in San Francisco called SoMa:

‘Inside the space there is a mix of private booths, modular tables that snake together, big meeting rooms with walls you can write on and a chill-out space with couches where people can read and think. Throughout the space, people working on different projects were either concentrating hard with earphones in and laptop keys tapping away, or chatting to each other across their shared tables.

It’s clear that Hub members are part of a community and not just a coworking space… It was not a workplace, but more a home away from home.’

The coworking model has been taken and modified to suit various visions and the possibilities of a shared workspace have also been explored. Just take Tokyo’s example, a coworking space called Moboff – a mash of the words ‘mobile’ and ‘office’. Moboff features ‘cloud IT support’, a location independent IT service that follows you around wherever you travel in the city. Moboff’s coworking hub is not confined to just one, but several offices in Tokyo. One thing that the coworking movement seems to recognise is the transient nature of an enterprise.

It appears that the seemingly humble idea of simply gathering a community of like-minded entrepreneurs to share a work environment has delivered a solution that a significant community of people were looking for: the benefit of a shared office space with none of the compromise.

The widespread acceptance of the coworking idea may be indicative of a broader trend emerging in an increasingly globalised and interconnected society. Botsman and Rogers would attribute it to a groundswell called ‘collaborative consumption’. The advent of new technologies such as peer-to-peer networks and online shopping have given way to a whole new method of consumption where sharing is done on a massive scale with no compromise to ‘ownership’ or the core supply and demand values on which our traditional business models are built upon.

As Botsman and Rogers put it, ‘collaborative consumption is not asking people to share nicely in the sandbox. On the contrary, it puts a system in place where people can share resources without forfeiting cherished personal freedoms or sacrificing their lifestyle.’ All of the benefits of a shared workspace with none of the compromise.

The coworking phenomenon is huge and, by the looks of things, here to stay.

To view residency packages at Vibewire’s own coworking space at the Enterprise Hub on Harris Street, Ultimo, click here.

Other coworking sites in Australia include:

The Cluster (Melbourne VIC)
Canberra Coworking (Canberra ACT)
The OpenHub (Melbourne VIC)
Hub Melbourne (Melbourne VIC)
CO-WORKA (Sydney NSW)