Co-Working, Is It Right For You?	Visited: 1022 Not rated Rate: Select 1 - Terrible 2 - Poor 3 - Average 4 - Good 5 - Outstanding
by Shannon Suetos May 20, 2010

If technology has taught us anything, it’s that you can find any information you need if you know how to look for it.  Smartphones have made this even easier, as now you can browse the Internet no matter where you are.  When starting a business, or even better have a small business, you are always looking for ways to save money, while keeping a high level of information and working environment.

As the owner of a small business you need to find new and creative ways to save money.  Finding quality ways to do any aspect of your business is a must, and you need to keep within your budget.  Co-working has become a great way to have a great office space, and it also makes it affordable.

Community Options
One of the newest trends in co-working is to rent a space in a building that is set up for exactly this.  Members of the community would have access to a conference room, fax machine etc.  These communites are great for people who may work from home, or just have a partner working with them. 

One great example of this is in Berkley, called the Sandbox Suites.  “Sandbox operates much like a gym or other club. Memberships can be bought by the day ($35 for an all day drop-in desk), or by the month ($495 for the “Second Home” package which includes full-time use of a private desk and six hours of meeting room time).”  Membership also includes free Wi-Fi, free coffee and there are printers, copiers and conference-call facilities on site.

Partnering Options
If you have more than one employee, the above option may not be the best.  Instead partnering up with another small company and sharing an actual office space may be more beneficial.  When looking for another small company to share a space with ask yourself a couple of questions:

• Can you both learn and grow from each other?
• Does it make sense to share a space?

If you both can gain knowledge and help each other it could be a great match.  If one company specializes in marketing and the other in web design, you could partner together to help each other’s business grow as well. 

Easy on the Budget
The number one reason (or at least in my opinion) co-working is beneficial to small businesses is that it saves you money.  Think about when you were in college, or just graduated, chances are you had a roommate.  Sharing a living space is much cheaper than living on your own, and you also get to share and grow with someone.  The same goes for co-working you can get a nicer space for a lesser cost.  Being able to save money on office space can allow you to spend your money on other things like office equipment, get those point of sales systems you have been needing or any other number of reasons.

How to Find a Co-Working Partner
Being an entrepreneur you may have friends doing similar things, and will be able to network that way.  If you don’t know anyone going into business, social media is a great way to network and find potential co-working partners.  With Twitter now allowing you to give location based tweets, you can find people with similar interests in your region.

LinkedIn and Facebook could be a good way to find someone, or at least get the word out your looking for someone to co-work with. Putting ads in the paper and on Craigslist could also be beneficial.  Whenever you are searching for a co-working partner, remember to interview them and get to know their goals for their company.  The match needs to be mutually beneficial so they will probably have questions for you as well.

In the end it all depends on what is right for you and your company.  Co-working has become popular over the years, and can be a great money saving opportunity in this hard economic time.