Tired of working from home? 10 advantages of working in a Cowork space

1. Reduce Costs

This is one of the great advantages of working in a cowork space. First of all, especially if you have your own SME or you work in one, does it pay to pay a rent (plus electricity and water) for your own space instead of renting an office in a cowork space? The answer is 99% of the time: of course not!

By choosing a cowork space you can rent an office for your team for a much lower price (you can rent monthly or only when it’s convenient), with better conditions than your old space, both in terms of price and, often, working conditions.

On a personal level the advantages are also clear: you can save on petrol (if you opt for a coworker close to home) avoiding daily commuting, or on the metro or bus pass.

2. Solutions For All Needs

In a traditional job, it can be difficult to find a workspace that meets all your needs. If you usually work in an Open Space, this may be great in terms of environment and maybe for some more creative tasks, but may be less suitable for tasks that require more concentration.

On the other hand, if you are a freelancer who spends most of his time alone in front of the computer, you may have difficulties dealing with isolation.

Or maybe you own a company and have come to the conclusion that your company doesn’t even need a fixed workspace and you just want to book an office once a week and make some presentations in a meeting room.

All these problems are solved by cowork spaces, which can work as much as your only workspace, as a complementary space or even just a support in the management of your business. You choose. You can either enjoy an Open space where you have the opportunity to work with other Coworkers or have an office for you and/or your team when they need more concentration.

3. Flexibility

Another advantage is that there is not only a standard solution regarding the modality and frequency with which you enjoy cowork: you can choose to go every day of the week, or to go just two days and be in the traditional office for three days. Or you can just use the cowork space when it’s convenient for you (for example when you need to hold a meeting or presentation), paying daily for it.

There are several possible modalities, you can choose the one that best suits your current needs, you can change modalities if your needs change.

4. Get Support In Your Business

If you are starting a new business or feel that your company is losing its way, it may be important to have support so that you can focus on the essentials.

Many cowork spaces offer Virtual Offices, which will allow you to stop worrying about the boring part of your company’s daily life and focus on what’s really important: tasks such as managing physical mail and parcels, as well as answering phone calls on behalf of your company, are ensured by many cowork spaces, so you can focus on the essential (to learn more about Virtual Offices in cowork spaces click here).

In addition, services such as creating your product online and implementing and developing a marketing plan to reach more customers, are other services available in some cowork spaces.

5. Networking and Potential Partnerships

Unlike when you have a traditional workspace where it is usually harder to have regular contact with workers from other companies, when you choose a cowork space you will “bump into” them every day. So it’s almost inevitable to meet other workers, which represents an opportunity not only to publicize your business or services, but also to develop potential partnerships, find investors or a right arm for your project.

In addition, cowork spaces are typically “meeting places” between freelancers and entrepreneurs, who have created or are creating their startups, which means that if you’re doing something similar, you can “drink” from experiences similar to yours, avoiding making the same mistakes that those entrepreneurs made.

6. Cowork Spaces Are Under Continuous Improvement & Evolution

This may seem unimportant, but in fact it is one of the distinguishing aspects when compared to what happens in the traditional offices of most companies: the owners of the cowork want to offer you the best possible work experience and constantly seek to improve it.

In most Portuguese company offices, it’s unlikely that your boss will ask you for regular feedback on whether you like the space and ask you what can change to make you feel better. Even if you take the initiative to give that feedback and it might make him think about your case, it’s very likely that this change will not be seen as a priority.

Now when you’re in a Cowork space, “your boss” as far as working conditions are concerned is the owners of the cowork and the service they offer you is the space, which means that for them there’s nothing more important than making sure you feel good and productive in that space. Do you understand the difference? The work of cowork owners is to offer you the best possible experience, which means that the probability of feeling heard and of the space constantly adapting to your needs in order to offer you the best possible working environment is much greater in a cowork space than in a traditional space.

7. "Cooler" Environment and Decoration

This is not to say that there are no exceptions, but as a rule most traditional workplaces and environments are still quite formal and uncreative. Cowork’s spaces such as WeWork have revolutionized the way we look at the workspace and the importance we give to the surrounding environment.

Besides generally having much more alternative and creative decorations than traditional offices, they are relatively spacious spaces, with good energy and motivated people.

In short, they are spaces where we quickly feel at home. It’s no accident that some of them sometimes even have a kitchen and changing rooms.

8. More than a Workplace

It has been more than proven that productivity at work is directly related to the well-being and mental health of workers. In this sense, cowork spaces do not offer only a workplace, but the opportunity to meet the members of this cowork through a set of experiences.

When you become a member of a cowork space, it can mean having access to a set of activities included in your membership: from yoga, running, movie sessions and even Friday beers, there are experiences for all tastes.

9. Higher Quality of Life

Working in a Cowork space can also mean having a healthier lifestyle. First of all, because as we’ve seen above, you can avoid the morning stress of staying in traffic for an hour every day by walking to your place of work. Besides saving on stress, you’ll also gain about 2 hours a day of productivity!

But it can also allow you to make a more radical change: so many people would like to leave the big cities and return to their homeland or simply go and live in the vacation home. Now more and more coworkers are being born in Portugal and so this no longer has to be a problem for you or your company.

10. Less Insulation = More Productivity

Especially if you work alone, are working at home due to the pandemic or work in a remote company, it can be quite difficult to have the ability to motivate yourself and be productive, especially if the only human being you have regular contact with is… yourself.

On the other hand, if you have company, but it’s the children running around the house or the noise of the maid vacuuming the floor, this may not be the idyllic scenario to increase your productivity.

Cowork spaces mean not only more human contact, but with humans with goals and purposes similar to yours: working.