Just a couple of months ago, my lovely team and I were having a conversation about what our “ideal” coworking conference would be. The event that __we dreamed of going to.

It had to be

– valuable for coworking newbies and veterans
– valuable for coworking space members (not just “industry” folks like us)
– and maybe most importantly, have as few barriers to entry as possible

After a couple of sessions on the trusty Indy Hall whiteboard and a handful of emails and conversations with members and friends, we came up with the People at Work Summit.

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There’s a whole lot more info over on the website, but here’s the skinny:

• It’s happening on April 21st, 2016.
• It’s spanning 24 hours, so there will be live programming in every time zone (including yours).
• And it’s entirely online – so you can join from anywhere with an internet connection.
• Every 10 tickets purchased provides 1 full scholarship to promote inclusion and diversity of awesome but under-represented people and nations. That’s community-powered financial aid right there, folks.
• Our “Founding Member” tickets start at just $99.

If you can’t tell, I’m as giddy as a school boy about this.

And today, we’re making the first batch of tickets available.

☞ Get your Founding Member ticket (less than 100 left in this batch!)

BTW, some people were paying closer attention than we expected and bought their tickets before we even made the announcement. So I’m pretty sure these will go fast!

This is a unique event that puts the focus on the people who work in collaborative environments, the people who contribute to the communities they are a part of, and the people who are saying “my version of success isn’t going to come from working alone.”

This is a unique event that erases physical borders so that we can come together as the global community that we really are, without the costs of travel and hassle of immigration. The internet is going to be our coworking space for a day.

This is a unique event that puts industry experts from outside of the field of coworking on the same virtual “stage” along side real people from inside of our communities.

And friends, I’ve gotta be blunt with you: we can’t be serious about working on the “future of work” if we don’t stop to really understand the “today of work.”

For 24 hours, we’re coming together to be mindful of the fact that no matter where we work or what we work on, business happens between people.

“Is this just a long webinar? That sounds boring.”

Nooooooo no no no no.

I’ll let you in on a little known secret: the internet is AMAZING for community building. 😉 Okay, maybe not so much a secret to some of you.

But most people just try to livestream an in-person conference, or worse, string together a bunch of webinars as if that’s the same thing as going to a conference. And that….is not what we’re doing on April 21st.

Instead, we sat down and asked “what are the best parts of a conference? What are the worst parts?”

And while everyone we talked to could think of one or two stand-out presenters, almost everybody said some version of the same thing:

I go to conferences to meet other attendees.

We can bring you the best speakers in the world – and we’re damn well going to – but the thing that sets a conference apart is the connections you can make with the other people who signed up to be there.

But just like tossing a bunch of people in a room and calling it “coworking” isn’t enough, tossing people into a chat room and calling it an “online conference” isn’t going to cut it either.

While we’re not suggesting that we can recreate the hugs, high fives, and happy hours of an in-person conference, I’m confident that if we work together we can create an online experience that makes you feel closer to someone on the other side of the world than you do to the people who are just down the street from you right now.

A $99 founding member ticket includes:

• The best priced ticket to the Summit.
• Full access to the 24 hour event on April 21st. No additional travel necessary.
• Access to a community chat room to meet other participants before AND during the event.
• Finding out new speakers before they’re officially announced.
• Over 30 live video talks, and instant replay videos.
• Automatically contribute to our scholarship pool.

See if the summit conference is right for you and find out how a “virtual conference” actually works.

And if you’d like to attend as a group – you can bring your team or sign up as a group of people who all work from the same coworking space – reply to this email with a rough headcount to learn about a group discount.

Want to meet another one of our speakers?

“I’m not good at small-talk. I’ve never liked it.

But I know it’s essential to breaking down those barriers because everyone has a story. Everyone brings something to the table.

And I’m genuinely curious – not just what can I get from you, but what can you teach me, what can I learn?”

Stephan Matanovic is the voice behind this quote, which I pulled from his interview in the most recent episode of The Coworking Weekly Show. He’s a member of Indy Hall who works in a field that you wouldn’t expect to find in a coworking space. But more importantly, you’ll find out how his entire approach to work changed, and how much happier he is now than just a few years ago.

Stephan will be one of our speakers at the Summit – and believe me when I say that this episode is really just scratching the surface of what he has to share.

You should go listen to this episode now – iTunes, Stitcher, or on the web– it’s easily one of the best episodes of this show we’ve done yet.

If you have any questions about the People At Work Summit, or want to suggest a potential topic or speaker that you REALLY want to see included in the program go ahead and hit reply to this email and ask away.

And get ready for April 21st. 🙂 It’s gonna be a blast.