The short but triumphant history of coworking in Melbourne
Coworking in Melbourne has only been around for just over a decade but it’s popularity has taken off in recent years and, given city’s base of creative freelancers, it’s not surprising.
Melbourne attracts creative freelancers like moths to a flame, thanks to its profile as the artsy, cultured sibling of Sydney. Melbourne’s first coworking space opened in 2007 and hundreds more have opened since then.
Why has this city, like many others, gone from zero to hundreds of coworking spaces? One reason could be that, on a macro scale, the way we work is changing. The gig economy and the overall decline of a unionised workforce means many workers, who would previously been a part of a corporate family, are out hustling on their own.
And for many, it’s not a bad trade. The autonomy of the freelancer to balance work, life, and family is intensely appealing, when you ignore the loss of job security and the amorality of a completely free market. But whether you chose the freelance life or not, it’s happening. The a thriving coworking community reflects a new workforce composition.
So, where did coworking start?
In its infancy, the then-innovative concept of coworking was introduced, tested, and validated in Silicon Valley, although they didn’t call it coworking.
There is a relatively high success rate for startups born in Silicon Valley. It’s been well documented that startups greatly benefit from the cross-fertilisation found in coworking spaces. In those early days, mentorship is invaluable. We often see paradigm-shifting innovation incubated in the tech industry where knowledge is considered open source. Many people theorise that the unprecedented early success of Silicon Valley is thanks to the close physical proximity of many developing technology companies. Physical closeness breeds knowledge convergence.
Knowledge convergence is coded in the way we organise physical space.
Space organisation is the infrastructure that enables different behaviours. The amphitheater is designed to allow many to focus on one speaker. A round table was designed for democratic discussion. And the open plan office was designed to encourage teamwork and knowledge sharing. Coworking is a step beyond the open plan office towards both fluid and open spaces that encourage collaboration, and the success of coworking as a concept could lie in the variety of spaces that coworking spaces must offer.
Having different space configurations (communal desks, standing desks, chill-out zones, private areas, meeting areas, etc.) will meet the varying needs of the office. And combine that with mechanisms that encourage people to mingle (like hot desking, social events, desk shuffling, community messaging channels, etc) and you introduce the dynamism that tech company offices thrive on. The caricature of a tech company, where everyone sits around on bean bags, is actually pretty accurate but hey, it’s working.
Knowledge sharing is the obvious benefit of a communal work environment but there are other less tangible benefits. As many freelancers would know, coworking spaces are also often the natural antitoxin to the loneliness of freelancing. Having access to a community can turn what feels like an unsustainable, transitional period in one’s career into a viable prospect.
The modern concept of coworking, of actively coalescing, was officially named coworking in 1995. A conglomerate of hackers started the first C-base, the first official coworking space, in Berlin.
Since then, thousands of spaces have opened up around the world including Melbourne. Now there are 152 spaces operating in Melbourne alone, varying in size, industry, and niche. Some of the most prominent include York Butter Factory, The Cluster, inspire9 and depo8, ACMI X, and the Hub.
The popularity of coworking, combined with the influx of freelancers (it’s estimated freelancers will make up 40% of the workforce by 2020 — #freelancelyf) mean that coworking may soon overtake traditional office spaces as the norm.
I work at Light Creative, a creative strategy agency in Melbourne. I found them when I was looking for a coworking space as a freelancer and got to know them by renting a desk in their space. They told me they couldn’t find an office they like, so they made one. Now we run and operate out of our own coworking space, Framework, alongside the agency and the live the benefits of knowledge sharing. The perks of running an agency within a coworking space are obvious — get social atmosphere, access to a pool of vetted freelancers and potential collaborators, and rich network of connections. And, of course, a constant stream of new faces, new people, and new ideas to-ing and fro-ing. It’s the perfect synergy for creatives. I could never go back to a traditional office environment and hopefully, if the popularity of coworking spaces and the coworking mentality keeps expanding, I’ll never have to.
Originally published at https://lightcreative.com.au/journal/the-history-of-coworking-in-melbourne/ on May 23, 2017.
