So sat on the train one morning, scrolling through Twitter as always! and saw a tweet about International Fruit Sticker Day. I thought shit there is a ‘international day’ pretty much for everything now.
Why isn’t there one for co-working? Aha a chance to invent one, to be the first to inaugurate such a global day and I’ve thought of it. Immediately with complete enthusiasm I tweeted, ‘I’m going to start an International Co-working Day’ – ‘send’.
Much to my disappointment back came an almost instant reply ‘there is already one’. Oh, that’s scuppered that plan and why didn’t I know about it as Founder of @Work Hubs, they NUMBER ONE CO-WORKING SPACE in Euston Street.
Not to be deterred, I thought actually what co-working really needs in order to be successful and to launch us all forth into the sharing economy and to turn us away from the old school failing world, is the one thing that it is really missing in most cases. That is collaboration.
So sitting just days later from my brainwave, I was with Ronald and Vincent from Seats2Meet, Francesca from OuiShare, Neil from the Entrepreneurs Cooperative and of course Bernie from Sharing Economy Radio and told them about this idea. From this came the plan to do International Collaboration Day.
That meeting and the subsequent work that we have all put into this, is the very example of why collaboration is so important in everything we do and should be the very essence of what co-working should be all about.
We are all much more successful when we stick to the core things that we are good at and partner with others to do the stuff that we are not good at.
A number of co-working spaces are really starting to embrace this and people are connecting – someone to share ideas with, someone to be a future supplier, customer, etc. Or even someone to share shit day with. After all, if you just want a desk and sit with your headphones on all day, then home-working or coffee shops are perfect for that.
Co-working should be the antidote to the isolation that many free-lancers, self-employed, entrepreneurs or corporate nomads face. It should be a space where friction points, serendipity and chance conversations leads to greater things and inspires all of us.
So for me International Collaboration Day is about encouraging co-working spaces globally to embrace the whole concept of their space being the canvas where people mesh together and create greater opportunities through collaborating together.
If you run a co-working space, then please get involved and if you are a ‘free’ spirit and want to help create a meaningful community, then go to your local co-working space and be a part of creating that.
By Philip Dodson – Founder of @Work Hubs
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Philip Dodson 