Coworking Started for a Reason — the Reasons Have Only Gotten More Important

✍🏻 From the Desk of Barbara Sprenger, Founder of Deskworks

You can’t turn on the radio, open the news or, um, eavesdrop, without hearing something about hybrid work. One company is embracing remote work and closing all their offices, another is demanding everyone come back to the office, and many are somewhere in the middle trying to navigate through the post-pandemic world of attracting employees who want to work remotely, while ensuring productivity and building company culture.

But what isn’t in question is the same thing that started the coworking movement over fifteen years ago: we have the tech tools to work anywhere, yet we are social beings. These technology tools can be used in such a way that people are in silos, isolated, or they can be used thoughtfully to enhance lives.

From a small-town idea to a global need

As we enter the next phase in the shifting workplace, it’s important to remember the societal issues that coworking addresses and the benefits that we don’t want to lose sight of – the benefits to workers, employers, communities and, not least, to our environment.

We started our first coworking space, Satellite Felton, long before we’d ever heard the word “coworking.” At that time one had to continually explain – many times to blank stares – why we thought it was a good idea to build local, community-based workplace centers. Now the reasons are obvious.

Life works better when work is close to home

By enabling workers to be closer to home during the working day, quality of life is just improved. Employees are closer to kids for sick days or school trips. There are more adults around in the community during the high-crime times of 3 – 6 pm. Each knowledge worker supports about 25 s.f. of retail in their local town. People are less stressed, more engaged in their communities, able to help kids with homework. Able to have a life.

For many, working in their home, though, was less than ideal. People were becoming more isolated and depressed when they worked by themselves all day. In their pajamas. They were continually distracted. By the laundry. The cat. The 3 year old. We could go on…

Cutting commutes, cutting carbon

Telecommuters on average use about 60% of the saved commute time for additional work for employers, but 40% goes to spending more time with family and friends: enhanced well-being. The annual cost of the commute to workers in our area is over $12,000 per year. What could one do with that savings?

Environmentally, though, the impact is huge. Early on, we calculated that each one percent of California’s workforce that moved away from a daily commute in a gasoline automobile – telecommuting or working closer to home – saved one million metric tonnes of CO2 emissions per year! That’s an important metric for employers, governments, and all of us.

Turning common sense into common practice

We expected that local governments would assist with the effort to build workspaces in communities, since the public benefits were so large. This didn’t really happen. We thought employers would assist employees with paying for coworking spaces, which is starting to happen. We just thought it would happen ten years ago. We didn’t understand the inertia in the system.

On the whole, we have the tools, and now the will and understanding, to foster a world where people can work anywhere in the world virtually, while truly connected in their community of choice. That’s what coworking is all about.

That has me excited once again.