The 5 Types of Coworkers Who Will Help Your Business Succeed
One of the reasons many business owners like to work in coworking spaces is because doing so will help them and their businesses succeed. Aside from the cost-effectiveness, amenities, and learning events that coworking spaces provide businesses, a huge advantage they give you is the network or community that you become a part of once you start renting a coworking space.
In business, success has less to do with what you know and more to do with who you know. This makes networking a vital part of business building. Coworking spaces understand this and provide you with a network of individuals and organisation from different backgrounds and with different expertise so that you may build meaningful connections with the people who can help your business grow and succeed.
Here are the 5 types of people you meet in coworking spaces who will help your business succeed.
1. The Freelancer
With technology changing the way people work today, more and more individuals are entering into the freelancing profession to give themselves more freedom. Since these individuals have no bosses and permanent offices, many of them are in coworking spaces to have a place to get things done and also to attract potential clients.
As a business owner, working alongside freelancers is advantageous because you no longer have to worry about outsourcing certain operations and tasks in your business. If you need programming, content writing, and social media management, you need only chat people up in coworking common rooms or go to the concierge to ask about freelancers and the task you need to get done and they will introduce you to some of them.
2. The Business Owner
Like yourself, other business owners are attracted to coworking spaces in the hopes of growing their businesses. Depending on the nature of your business and their businesses, your businesses might complement each other and have the opportunity to work together or collaborate, benefitting both your businesses.
Additionally, being among other business owners could benefit you greatly even if you could not do business together or collaborate. Being members of the same coworking community, it is your fellow business owners that will empathise with you and make you feel like you’re not alone. It is with them that you can trade stories, insider information, and feedback on your respective businesses and how you run them. When there are learning opportunities provided by the coworking space for business owners, it is you who will be accompanying each other and helping make sure that every learning opportunity is maximised.
3. The Startup Founder
More than any kind of business, coworking spaces will have startups, and you will meet people who are not only part of startups, you will meet the founders of the startups. Coworking spaces are a great place for startup founders looking to establish themselves and their businesses in the market. Joining the coworking community allows them to make themselves known to businesses, freelancers, and professionals in the coworking community. At the same time, this is an opportunity for you to meet these startup founders and learn from them and grow with them.Â
Unlike SMEs, startups have leaner company structures and are often have more struggles on their hands to stay afloat. This situation breeds strong and innovative individuals whom you could partner or collaborate with. Since startups are up and coming, they are looking for ways to establish themselves; working together in endeavours that would further both your goals is a great opportunity for both of you to cut costs and maximise manpower and scale of a project which should help both your business and their startup.
4. The Corporate Employee
More and more multinational corporations and large scale companies are putting their employees in coworking spaces to get in touch with businesses, startups, and professionals. Though employees have less control over their companies compared to fellow business owners and startup founders, they are your gateways to companies you otherwise will not have access to.Â
There is also a lot to be learned from corporate employees from their company structure and operations to their company culture and values. These are things you can learn from observing corporate employees while at work and from interacting with them on a daily basis.
The Professional Individual
There are professionals — accountants, lawyers, consultants, coaches, speakers, etc. who also spend their workdays in coworking spaces. These individuals are establishing their practices and putting themselves in coworking communities to make their services more accessible. As a member of a coworking community yourself, you can choose to get in touch with these professionals who can help your business through their respective services. Instead of hunting online endlessly for someone you don’t know, you can meet these professionals through coworking events, in the common room, or via your coworking community’s SNS. It’s always better to know who you will work with on a personal level so take the time to get to know these professionals; it will help you determine whether they’re the right fit for the job you have in mind.
