Seven Factors to Consider When Choosing a Coworking Space

The rise of coworking spaces in this era is giving members an amazing work life balance. The relationships they build and the synergies they create assist them in several ways across their business. This shows just how important it is to select an ideal workspace that works for you.

Nowadays, coworking offices, or shared workspaces have cropped up across all the popular areas in cities. It’s so imperative to find a coworking space that suits your needs and requirements the best, and makes you feel right at home, well, at work! For most of us, a simple Google search will do the trick – it’ll list out the top few shared offices and make your job of sorting through all the coworking offices easier. Then there’s always word of mouth, which in our opinion, is actually more reliable than Google, since the people telling you about these places have actually based their offices from there. But at the end of the day, none of the suggestions from Google or your friends will help you to arrive at the decision of finalising a spot. It’s all going to come down to the amenities and facilities they offer, networking opportunities they can create for you, the productivity and creativity you feel at their offices, and of course, how economical they are for your company.

Here are seven major contributing factors to consider when selecting a coworking space –

1. Location

Your coworking space’s location is super important to keep in mind in the sense of how accessible it is and how easy it is to reach the office, not just for yourself, but for your clients as well. Having your coworking office in a posh area is always going to bring about a feeling of superiority and will show your business in a good light with your clients. Having a top floor office with an inspiring view that sprawls across the city is definitely a great boost to your productivity and creativity. They break away from tedious and long working days, and let you wander and stumble upon new ideas that give your business an edge.

Having your shared office space near to your residence is always a boon and will reduce your travel time, and will get you home faster. It’s always going to be more convenient and will reduce your non-productive day time massively.

For example, Connekt Coworking in Ahmedabad is situated at the center of the city and enjoys the facility of having all the transport connectivity it can. It is perfectly located at Memnagar, Gurukul and has Ahmedabad One Mall within walking distance, lots of convenience stores nearby and several fine dining restaurants around.

2. Community

A coworking space is incomplete without its community. One of the biggest benefits of being a part of a shared workspace is the community that’s at the touch of your fingertips – a community you can engage with, establish synergies with and one that you can collaborate and build lifelong memories with. The diversity found in the communities of coworking spaces is astounding. At coworking spaces, you find heads of Fortune 500 companies working alongside heads of start ups. Each member, irrespective of the industry they come from, lends his/her hand to each other to progress personally, professionally and grow together as a community. People of different genders, castes, careers and industries come together and inspire one another for the better. And hence, it’s so important to select a coworking space with a vibrant and ever growing community.

3. Work Environment & Interiors

A workplace is where you run your business from, and spend most of your waking work day hours at. Coworking spaces are thus, intricately designed to be ergonomic in nature, and lots of importance is given to the interiors of the workspace. Coworking offices usually have premium and classy interiors, with fun break-out zones having out of the box designs that inspire members. One of the best parts of being a member of coworking spaces is the luxury of having a beautiful infrastructure and Instagram worthy interiors that can be boasted about to friends, family and clients alike.

A soundproof environment should also be taken into consideration for those who love to focus at the job at hand with minimal disturbance from outside sources. A comfortable cabin, or desks should be specifically chosen to cater to your needs and you must always use your trial days at coworking offices to understand what exactly it is that you’re looking for, before you reserve your seat.

Your work environment directly contributes to your efficiency and productivity. A well maintained, neat and hygienic work environment with great lighting and ventilation that makes you feel energetic and positive will definitely have a positive impact on the way you work towards making your business grow and succeed. And of course, at the end of a long hard work day, your coworking office should have a lounge area where you can kick back and relax, and maybe enjoy a few beverages from the coworking café.

4. Amenities

One of the major attraction points of a coworking space are the amenities that they have to offer. Fully furnished professional offices are coming up almost everywhere. The main differentiator between them and coworking offices are the facilities that the members can avail over and above the traditional benefits of renting out an office space. Shared workspaces have a vast range of services – cafeteria, office maintenance, fully equipped conference rooms and meeting rooms, private phone booths, valet parking services, unlimited coffee and tea, high speed wifi, CCTV cameras and security, fully air conditioned offices, great lighting and ventilation, printing and photocopy services, reception services and more. Coworking workspaces may charge differently for a few of these amenities, but overwhelmingly all of these amenities are usually covered in the membership cost. Conventional office spaces will be unable to catch up to the additional facilities coworking spaces have to offer, that too at no extra cost!

For example, here are the amenities provided by Connekt co-working spaces in Gurukul, Ahmedabad to it members –

• Conference Rooms
• Meeting Rooms
• Informal Meeting Rooms
• Car Parking
• Reception Support
• High Speed Internet
• Printer / Scanner / Photocopy
• Office Supplies
• Private Phone Booth
• Hot Beverages
• The Table (Café)
• Events
• Office Maintenance
• CCTV Cameras
• Biometric Access

You must compare a few coworking spaces before finalising one, keeping in mind each of the amenities they have to offer. You can even make use of their free trial days to get a complete understanding of the people there, the amenities they offer and how well the coworking space suits your needs.

5. Budget

Here comes the big question which you’ll be looking for, to get an office space in your budget with all expectations of an office space? Well, we all know Cash burn on operation for early days in business or freelancing is always crucial and a deciding aspect. The answer to this will be to start searching for a co-working space with a basic facility such as quality furniture, abundant lighting and proper placements of electrical points to ensure proper productivity other than that you should be looking for internet connection, availability of tea and coffee and housekeeping as must start working in a co-working space. You can find options starting from 4000 INR per seat.

Those who are looking for a better environment to work from and a professional set up with all amenities such as conference rooms, unlimited tea and coffee and other add few add-ons can find options starting at 6000 INR per seat.

Proper co-working spaces with spacious interiors, multiple conference rooms, lavish lounge area, recreational rooms and posh location which create an impression on the client as well employees help maintain the work-life balance with proper coexistence community with all standard co-working amenities, options are available from 8000 INR per seat.

It all depends upon what are your expectation from an office space and how deep are your pockets to select from the option available in it, but to compare it with conventional Office space’s-working spaces will always be a better option when it’s compared to fully operational office space as it includes all the major cost which are to be paid even after hiring a fully furnished office cost such as Electricity, Taxes, Repairs, Broadband connection,

Housekeeping, extra helper and many other costs which just adds on to owning your own office.

6. Service

Service is the name of the game, and it’s one of the most prioritised aspects when selecting a coworking space for your business. One must look at reviews of the coworking space and must speak with people from the coworking community before finalising things for their business. A lot of the times, shared workspaces offer things that they do not have the bandwidth to follow through on, and ultimately, leave the clients high and dry with their requirements. A responsible community manager and professional support staff at the co-working space will do wonders for your business, and you can then truly focus on growing your business and letting the workspace manage the trivial problems for you.

7. Brand

Brand reputation is built over the years’ of professionalism and constant service in a particular industry. You should always look to select a coworking brand or a real estate brand which provides these services at economical costs because it’s always better to stay secure working with them, rather than face the instability of unknown brands.

For example, reputed and longstanding companies like the Gala Group in Ahmedabad have gotten into the coworking business with their latest venture Connekt Coworking based in Memnagar, Ahmedabad where they provide the best of services, amenities and interiors with the surety of stability and prestige.

For workspaces that inspire, and coworking members who love to collaborate on exciting, new projects, Connekt Coworking is the place to be at. To explore a range of our coworking options in Ahmedabad that can meet your needs, call us on +91 7567979000 or email us at connekt@connekt.co.in.