I don’t think we’re solving
a “cubicle problem”
With my coworking “trendwatching” hat on, I notice a lot of patterns of the changes in focus of coworking. One thing I’ve noticed come up and become prominent, is the “battle against the cubicle”.
Battling against the cubicle is a reflection of our time, and a valiant effort for sure. But I’m often reminding myself and others that while on the surface, coworking may appear to be the white knight leading the crusade against the cubicle, that’s only the battle.
There’s a war to be won.
Business. Is. Broken.
Especially in America, where capitalism and a free market economy have shown their best and worst sides, business has overwhelmingly fallen victim to the transaction. Because business and commerce are often synonymous, and many of us (or our parents or grand parents) lived through an industrial revolution where the invention of the assembly line changed the bottom line of business, things have changed.
In the last 50+ years, business in America has become fixated on maximizing transaction. Even moreso in the last 20-30 years.
While profits soar, industries with soaring profits crumble. Dotcom. Housing. Banking. History repeats itself – every time transactions are “maximized” by some newly invented math, another element of business is suffering.
The “lost art” of business is caring. The “lost art” of business, is relationships.
I’m not talking about the misbegotten way that “social media” has re-presented relationships to business, either. Social media has completely borked the first opportunity for businesses to really operate on relationships again by generating transactions – followers, tweets, likes, votes, and calling them “community” and “friendship”.
I’m talking about real, honest-to-goodness relationships. The ones that take time.
I noted this excerpt from the business etiquette section of the Fodors guide to Barcelona:
The reigning philosophy is that, first we get to know each other, and then we might do business together. So the eating and drinking, wining and dining part of the transaction, far from a waste of time, is the most imporant part of the encouter; because if you flunk that part, the deal’s not happening no matter what conditions are offered.
In Japan, business deals are often preceded by weeks if not months of social interaction, for the same reason.
I believe that restoring this concept, and this skill, to American business is the #1 long-term value of coworking.
All of the other benefits of coworking aren’t inhibited by this focus. In fact, they are improved.
When relationships are the focus, people earn trust. And a lack trust is at the core of every bit of brokenness in corporations, including but not limited to those pesky cubes.
I’ve wondered to myself, what is the ultimate impact that Indy Hall can have on the world? Not just Philadelphia – but the world. And I don’t think that showing companies an alternative to cubes is good enough.
I think that by continuing to focus on relationships, and working to restore the understanding and desire for relationships to be at the heart of every business and organization, we can have a profound impact on business and the world it operates in.
My hope isn’t for everybody to work from a coworking space. It’s simply not practical, and it’s selling something to lots of people who not only don’t need it – they don’t want it.
My hope, my genuine honest to goodness hope, is that by growing Indy Hall the way we do, and helping others to do the same, that there’s an increased possibility that the business leaders of tomorrow have worked from a coworking space like Indy Hall at some point in their careers.
Working from a place like Indy Hall can have a fundamental impact on how you value relationships as a part of getting work done. If by operating coworking spaces, we can help re-introduce the priority of relationship building to business, the mega-businesses of 5 years, 10 years, 20 years from now will operate in a fundamentally different way.
In a way that changes the interactions between bosses and their teams. In a way that changes the interactions between companies and their vendors. In a way that changes the interactions between companies and the cities they provide opportunities to.
In a way that changes the way that makes the world a better place to work, live and play.
The funny part is that having worked on this for the last 5 years, I’ve seen how natural it is. We’ve worked so hard to create an unnatural business experience, it’s time to undo the damage.
If you’re interested in building better businesses and disrupting the commercial “status quo”, I highly recommend Umair Haque’s The New Capitalist Manifesto. He can be a challenge to follow on Twitter, but his book does an amazing job of capturing the damage we’ve done/are doing by pretending that the current mode of operation is actually working, and presents cases and examples of businesses “reinventing capitalism”. In fact, I’d posit that they’re returning to the roots of capitalism, rather than operating in the bizzarro-reality we’ve made for our business selves.
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A Hall Pass for Bureaucracy –
Code for America Philadelphia
I haven’t really had a chance to talk much about Code for America since the team was in Philly. I won’t go into what the program is or how it works, because frankly I don’t think I can do a better job than their about page. But I really enjoyed having the CFA fellows in town earlier this year.
Every interaction with them was thoughtful, interesting, inspiring, and fun.
While I was excited when I found out that Philadelphia was one of the pilot cities for the new program, I was admittedly dubious. Realistically, how effectively could this group glean enough information and insight in <30 days (28 days, since it was February), then leave Philadelphia and build something that citizens and the city will find mutually useful. It’s a pipedream. A pretty pipedream. The reality of the work product is still to be seen.
After the team had left Philadelphia at the end of February , I had a chance to think about the process we all went through and realized soemthing.
I don’t think the “thing” that the Code for America fellows build, or how it’s used, is the most valuable result of the program.
A Hall Pass for Bureaucracy
When I first heard about Code for America, what intrigued me the most was the concept of a “bolt-on” group of individuals who ultimately have to abide by the rules of operating within government and the civic ecosystem, but at the same time, are given a bit of a “hall pass” to move through the layers of bureaucracy.
The ability to jump across the silos of the institution, and to interact with genuine interest and intrigue across the entire spectrum of individuals with civic interest, from “Joe six-pack” through Mayor Michael Nutter and his staff.
I could be premature on this, but I think that the “hall pass” seems to be the magic of Code for America.
The vantage point and perspective the experience gives the fellows seemed to be unique, and I appreciated hearing about the experince from them. But it left something else behind that I hadn’t expected.
Hansel and Gretel Left a Trail of Breadcrumbs
Intentional or not, the Code for America fellows left a “breadcrumb trail” through the city to individuals, departments, and institutions that are ripe for being “hacked”. Not in the nasty LULZsec way, but in a really positive, civic way.
Since February, it’s felt easier to navigate through the same layers of bureaucracy and silos of institution, to find somebody who welcomes a citizen with benevolent self-interest. I now have a short list of people and departments that I have a pretty strong degree of confidence that if I approach them, I won’t be met with the usual, “What do you want?”, and instead a genuine interest, “What are you working on? Oh…that’s cool! Anything we can do to help? I bet somebody else around here would think that is interesting”.
This is anecdotal, but something I’ve seen for myself, but I’ve seen others experience as well so it’s not just me.
It’s also not a 100% transformation. There’s still plenty of “What do you want?”, still effective at getting in citizens’ ways. Still effective at getting in their own ways.
To be fair, I think that Philly was already on its way through a transition. There’s an interesting new guard of leadership, even if not all of the leadership is new. But Code for America helped heat-map where it’s happening the most. There are hot-spots, places where people like me, the citizens with a benevolent self-interest and a desire to see Philly totally kicking ass, can concentrate our efforts and see the greatest affect.
I think that the CFA process helped prime the pumps for the continued development of a new style of trusting relationship between city hall and citizens. Something that Indy Hall in particular is really good at, and we’ve been recognized for.
“Civic Fusion”
Jeff Friedman has quickly become one of my favorite people that works in City Hall. A paraphrased quote of his made it into a recent bit of press on AOL’s Travel Blog. Jeff’s title, according to this Flying Kite piece about Code for America’s 2012 reprise in Philadelphia, is Manager of Civic Innovation and Participation for the City of Philadelphia. I’m not exactly sure how Jeff describes this, but based on the projects I’ve seen him work closest with – not notably Code for America and the Open Data Philly initiative, are great examples of what he calls “Civic Fusion”. I’m going to try to break down his term into something that sounds less like a Vitamin Water flavor (hat tip to my #whyilovephilly co-conspirtators for that reference).
Remember how I talked about Code for America as a group of citizens that can easily “bolt on” to the civic infrastructure? Imagine if that became the rule, rather than the exception. Imagine if, when a group of citizens was working on something that would bring some form of benefit to the city, there was a known operating procedure for the city standing along side them and simply say “this is a good thing”.
Maybe a press quote. Maybe a public “thumbs up” from our Mayor or another appropriate government official. A vote of confidence from city hall goes a LONG way.
Even better, a genuine interest from government employees to be involved in these civic activities, not necessarily as a government employee but as a citizen themselves. It’s nice to see people like Philly’s Chief Cultural officer Gary Steuer reminding people that even though he’s a city official, he’s a citizen too. That’s an attitude I can get behind.
While the Flying Kite article seems to paint “Civic Fusion” in a light where the focus is “tools” and “the internet”, I think that this sort of relationship and interaction between citizens is ultimately the foundation for a construct that those “tools” and “the internet” will thrive in.
I’m not entirely sure what the end result should be, what it looks like, or if that was even part of the “plan” for the Code for America model to assist in unearthing.
But it doesn’t matter. I’m really glad its happening in Philadelphia.
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We Work In Philly – 600 members later
It’s been 20 days since Linus and I launched WeWorkInPhilly.
With only a couple of blog mentions (thanks TechnicallyPhilly and Geekadelphia) and nothing but word of mouth around the city, the site has racked up:
- 600 members
- 172 companies
- 39 groups
- 41 products/projects
- 38 resources
Nice.
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On Risk Taking
I spent some time this afternoon having an excellent conversation about many, many different things with my new friend Kira Campo. I’m hoping I can get a copy of her notes because we covered a lot of ground and I stopped taking notes when I realized I couldn’t read my own handwriting. But for the last hour I’ve had something in my head that needs to get out.
Before I go on, I want to point out that one of Indy Hall’s core assets has been it’s ability to build networks of trust. Back to that in a moment.
Risk taking means different things to different people. To an entrepreneur, it may mean betting it all on a big idea. To an artist, it may mean sharing or inciting an emotion. To many working class americans, it may be leaving a job that’s anywhere from “okay” to “god-awful” in pursuit of something better.
But I think that if you dissect successfully (read: healthy) risky behavior, it comes down to an either innate or learned ability to trust yourself.
And I’m not talking about skydiving, swimming with sharks, doing drugs, or having unprotected sex – that’s not risky, it’s dangerous.
“See what is possible in what you don’t yet understand, share what is possible in what you see differently.” – Hilary Austin at TEDxSoma
Kira reminded me of this quote that I tweeted from TEDxSoma back in the middle of June. I’d forgotten about it, but hearing it again put it in a new light.
If I think about the risk-takers I admire, they spoke out about what they thought was possible in what they saw differently and shared that with others. That took a large degree of trusting themselves to be more than right – but to not be alone in wanting to be right.
I think back to when I first met Chris Messina and Tara Hunt – these two people were operating on a completely different set of frequencies from the ones that my employer-at-the time was.
On one hand, the way they were thinking, talking, and acting was different from the environment that I actively wanted to remove myself from. On the other hand, and more importantly, that they validated my feelings that what I was thinking could be realized in the form of words and actions.
I went from being alone in my craziness to realizing that I could trust myself to be right. And that’s when I started to open my mouth and bring words into action, even when it seemed risky – because I learned to trust myself, and I understood that somebody else could be having the same experience I was having before I’d met Chris and Tara.
If they unlocked me, who could I unlock, simply by trusting that I wasn’t alone?
Risk taking is a polarizing activity no matter how you slice it. But when you lead risk taking with trust, rather than disillusionment or false hopes & expectations, amazing possibilities lie on the other side.
What are you doing to help people learn to trust themselves rather than operate on disillusionment and false hopes & expectations?
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Some Frequently Asked Coworking Questions
I really do enjoy answering coworking questions that find their way into my inbox, and the best questions are the ones that are discreet and to the point. I recently was emailing with Joshua Hill, the director of a new coworking effort in Bozeman, Montana.
I visited Montana last summe with some close friends and it earned a special place in my heart, so Joshua got some “special treatment” and extended answers. I gave him a little bit of tough love, but the results were positive – he replied with a clear understanding of his newfound goals, in his own words, and that was rewarding. I asked for his permission to post his questions and my answers, and here they are.
Q. I am planning to open with a “launch week” Aug. 15 – 19. I have a speaker on innovation as part of our speaker series set for one night. An art showcase for another night. I’m wondering what you did for events at the beginning to get people in the door to see and try out the space?
A. Sounds like you’re already making it about the space and the “things” in it, rather than about the people you want to attract. You’re going to need to go out and meet people on their turf, earn trust and respect, and get them excited about how awesome THEY can be one they walk in the door.
We spent 6+ months attending OTHER peoples events, as active participants of the community. We earned a ton of trust and started rolling our own events based on what people obviously wanted but nobody else was doing. What we did doesn’t matter – what you see, the gaps of opportunities you see, will matter the most.
Q. I am working on an “orientation packet” and I have read on the google groups that no one actually reads these. However, I do think it’s important to have. My question is what do you give to your new members when they sign up and does it vary depending on the membership model they join?
A. You need to do one of our drop-in days before signing up. We’ve minimized rules, regulations, and policies so there’s really not much that goes into our first-timer one-sheet. Our goal is for somebody to go from door to sitting down and working as quickly as possible, with as few things to do/review as possible. That said, over the course of the day, needing to ask where the bathroom is, how to make a cup of coffee, etc, are social interactions that new members actually gain immense value from.
We look at every interaction carefully and determine if it’s valuable from a socialization perspective. If not, we try to automate. If it is, we work to preserve it (even if it’s more difficult than the streamlined alternative). That friction creates opportunities for people to share experiences. That’s the value we provide.
Q. How do you have your building access set up? Key, keyless, open-door, etc…
A. We’re low tech and simple – keys for entry, a front desk (with a person at the desk from 9-6) for non-keyholders to get access.
We have a social system for distributing keys, too. Only full time members are eligible to receive keys, and they must a) wait 30 days and b) get 3 signatures from other existing key holding members. This forces people to interact, and build enough trust. It’s not really about the keys, it’s about creating opportunities those interactions that make bad things less likely to happen.
Q. How do you bill coworkers?
A. We used a google spreadsheet for record keeping for 2 years until we couldn’t anymore. We accept google checkout and paypal because most people know how to use them. We use Zoho invoicing now that we’re over 100 members and rely heavily on automation of our billing systems, but if you’re looking for something to get started with a great tool, I recommend Cobot.
Q. I have been hired as director of the space. Do you act as the director or employee people to operate the space or is it run by your members?
A. I’m going to be honest: I don’t know what a “director” does. We have a single part-time office manager position to keep an eye on things and keep the space open during business hours. It’s a highly sought-after job, because this person gets to interact with the most members and gets paid a stipend (on top of free workspace at Indy Hall) to do it. It’s not a full time job – every person in this role (myself included) has had another primary source of income, and they were in this more for the opportunity than the cash. All three people (four if you count me) grew personally and professionally – inside of a year they needed me to hire a replacement because they were swamped with their “other work”, or they’d found the thing that they really loved to do as a result of the position, and wanted to focus on that for a while.
At the end of the day, we’re an LLC and a profitable company. We did that so we could be sustainable, and have the operation outlive my and my business partner’s involvement.
But the other thing we needed in order for that to happen was our “members first” approach, which has produced members who have a strong sense of ownership even though they don’t have specific titles, or even ownership of the business. They know that if they want to see something, done and it’s aligned with our goals, we’ll help THEM do it – but we don’t do it for them.
My role is and always has been being a leader and a catalyst. Apart from going out and talking about coworking, signing checks/contracts with vendors, and making strategic business decision, my most common role is two fold:
- Provide context – help people see themselves as members of Indy Hall
- Provide permission – its a societal norm that you need to ask for permission to do something. My goal is to break that apart. Most of the time people want something or want to do something, and the only thing in their way is they don’t know who to ask for permission. Even if the permission isn’t mine to grant, I do what I can to grant it.
There’s a massive industry of “innovation and entrepreneurship” that’s full of whiteboards, whitepapers, and theoretical concepts. If you look closely, nothing is really happening. My job is to look for things that are likely to happen and make sure they have a fighting chance.
Q. Last question! I know the community is the most important part for this idea to grow. Any thoughts or pitfalls on getting the community to be a community?
A. You can’t get a community to be a community, so get that idea out of your head as quickly as you can. A community is an organism. It’s like asking “how do you get a fish to be a fish”.
You don’t own the community, you don’t manage the community. You garden. You observe. You catalyze. You support. You belong to them, not the other way around.
Some recommended reading:
http://dangerouslyawesome.com/2008/12/a-roadmap-for-community-organization-and-mobilization-harvey-milk/ http://dangerouslyawesome.com/2010/09/coworking-lets-things-happen/ http://dangerouslyawesome.com/2011/03/coworking-zones-of-proximal-development/ http://dangerouslyawesome.com/2011/04/on-monocultural-coworking/ http://dangerouslyawesome.com/2011/05/should-a-coworking-space-run-itself/ http://dangerouslyawesome.com/2010/12/on-economic-development-centers-and-coworking/ http://dangerouslyawesome.com/2010/11/take-interest-dont-fake-interest/ http://dangerouslyawesome.com/2010/11/encouraging-collaboration-in-coworking/ http://dangerouslyawesome.com/2011/05/designing-coworking-for-collaboration/ http://dangerouslyawesome.com/2011/06/a-coworking-parable-the-game-of-chess/
Also, pick up a copy of this: http://www.amazon.com/Starfish-Spider-Unstoppable-Leaderless-Organizations/dp/1591841437
Lots to read through, but this should help your head get into the right place.
I hope I get to visit an epic coworking community in Montana at some point in the future. Keep me posted.
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