WeWork versus IWork

A colleague just spent the day at a WeWork and commented on how badly named it was.

It’s official, WeWorks are so hard to work in. Ironic really.

Most of his role, and mine, involves deep thinking about things and then implementing them. The WeWork open environment is not necessarily conducive to that. Maybe that’s why it is called “WeWork” rather than “IWork”. If your job involves talking to people all day then it works. If your job involves thinking it doesn’t.

They do have “phone booths” which give a level of isolation however these are meant to be just for conversations and are not meant to be used continuously for non-conversational work. You can try and find somewhere where no-one else is but the natural tendency for people to seek out space to work means that eventually someone else will end up there.

His next comment was:

I’d like to work at a “WeIsolate”. I’d like to start a co-working space that’s all about not co-working but maybe co-habiting with occasional interaction. Those could already exist though, see: libraries

Maybe there is a half way house for common office spaces? A whole set of small one or two person offices and then the larger areas are for the larger conversations. Maybe a bit like some hotels consist of rooms, or pods, with the minimal facilities and minimum space there could be something similar for offices.