7 Ways to Boost Productivity at a Coworking Space

A coworking space is an environment that’s intended to accommodate employees from various companies who come to work independently on different projects. It’s unlike a usual office workspace because the employees in coworking spaces typically aren’t working for the same organization.

There are nearly 19,400 coworking spaces in the world. Managed offices were a comparatively unknown phenomenon a decade ago; however, it seems to gradually attract the business industry as a creative and ingenious concept.

This idea is contrary to the old school of thought that employees must be supervised in an office to be productive and efficient. The concept of a coworking environment has been around since 1995, but it has become more popular because of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Coworking has many advantages over a typical workspace, ranging from the convenience of a routine to a friendly environment and added technological benefits. On the other hand, some experts think that there is no privacy in these spaces, and it is difficult for people to concentrate on their jobs, making them less productive.

It brings us to the question of how to enjoy the perks of coworking while improving performance and productivity. Don’t worry! It happens to be the topic of our article today.

7 Ways to Boost Productivity in a Coworking Space

1. Choose The Ideal Coworking Space

Environment and locality must be prioritized when choosing to take up an office space for rent. Selecting the right location to work from contributes substantially to the growth and success of your company. Don’t forget to check all of these boxes before settling on a coworking space:

Each person might prefer one location over another; however, safety and distance from residence are usually the most critical factors when selecting a workspace. Make sure you feel happy and comfortable in the area before signing a lease.

2. Try to Keep Distractions at Bay

There is a big difference between working at a traditional office or home or in a coworking space. At home, a person might be with a couple of his family members or completely alone.

And if you work in some office, you know that the number of employees is restricted by the size of the business you work for. But working in a coworking space is the opposite experience. You will feel several distractions when working and one of them is noise.

How to not get affected by the noise around you?

It would help if you used earmuffs or headphones while working to avoid noise and to concentrate on your work. Headphones would be the preferred choice for those who like to listen to music while working.

Although, if you prefer to work in complete silence, you should use earmuffs.

The next major distraction you might encounter in a coworking space is having dull people around you. These people are never serious about their work, and they can distract you with some suggestions, questions, small talk, etc.

How to stay away from tiresome people?

A simple and easy way is to ignore these employees, but this attitude might make people think you’re arrogant. So, the other way is to put up a warning sign as “Do Not Disturb” that would tell others about your reluctance to communicate.

There are many other distractions in a working space, but one is in your control – your brain.

Yes, it is serious. Many people can not help but divert themselves by doing things unrelated to their work. That is why you must practice self-discipline. A person should not let social media sites or YouTube videos distract him.

3. Use Flexibility to Your Benefit 

Regardless of your forte, you might have observed some tasks you get done efficiently when no one is around and specific tasks you need to work on in conjunction with others.

And a significant advantage of coworking spaces is that they allow you to work where you like and as you like. When you want to concentrate on a job and don’t want any diversions, pick a spot in the corner of the room.

On the other hand, when you feel you would profit from being around people, take your device and sit with a group.

Moreover, you can even go a step ahead and adjust your office working hours to enhance productivity. Of course, you can do this only if your company allows it. Start your day early if you are more productive in the morning and vice versa. You have to schedule your work accordingly.

4. Spatial Planning / Interior Design

The primary function of a workplace is to enable its employees to finish the tasks given to them within a deadline. An interior design of a coworking place is essential for building a productivity-focused alternative for work-from-home (WFH) or remote workers.

Employees need a few crucial things to be productive. And you can cover all of them through intelligent space planning:

Moreover, you should always take into account the cleanliness of a workspace. A dirty table or floor demoralizes the workers. It usually brings terrible emotions, and your will to work diminishes. So, a clean interior is also important.

5. Avoid Procrastination

Every person at some point faces the problem of procrastination. Procrastination means when a person delays or postpones the work they are supposed to do for a later time. It is very harmful and can hurt your performance at work.

So, what is the leading cause of procrastination? It happens when a person is forced to do a task he doesn’t like or even hates. Or it could happen as a result of writer’s block if you are a creative person.

Although you can embrace it in an unpreventable situation, you should not make it a habit.

Follow these tips to avoid procrastination in a coworking space:

6. Have Meaningful Interactions

Collaboration and networking are two main benefits that attract people to coworking spaces. Making new friends or making a business connection is often productive. So, you can improve productivity in a coworking space just by providing social opportunities to people.

However, it would be best to talk with people around you in the workplace, but these interactions should be meaningful. Talking about a new movie or a TV show or sharing gossip doesn’t count as networking.

Let’s assume you find some guy you want to work or collaborate with.
Instead of bothering them every few minutes with a query or an idea, make a list of ideas you want to discuss and reserve some time in both of your schedules to discuss this.

If your partner approaches you in the middle of a project, be kind but firm and let them know when you’re taking a break.

7. Mix Your Perpetual Work with Some Outdoor Activity

A job becomes intolerable when it is boring. A tedious job is perpetual as a fact. And boredom is an adversary of productivity.

The only way to get away from monotonous, tedious work is by mixing it with certain outdoor activities. If there is ping pong, a pool, or any other game in your coworking space, try to play it daily.

It would help if you took some downtime to listen to music or audiobooks or get up from your seat and sit in a cozy corner. And if your coworking space is located near a beautiful and tranquil environment, take some time off and walk around the lawn.

Although, if there is no specific place for engaging in physical activity in your coworking space, it is not a problem. You should find a corner where you can do sit-ups or push-ups, at least.

Another great piece of advice is to find your time during the job and go to a gym. Let’s assume that you work eight hours each day. Just take a “sports break” in the middle of the day to work on your body.

5 Benefits of Coworking Spaces

1. Professional Environment to Meet Potential Clients

You may enjoy remote work or Work-From-Home a lot- especially if you hardly ever feel anxious or lonely. All your meetings happen through Microsoft Teams, Zoom, Google Teams, or other conference apps.

However, assume you had a Microsoft presentation with a team of actual clients. Would you go to their home? Or invite them to yours?

Although it’s possible, holding work meetings at your client’s or yours is not entirely professional. The good thing is that you don’t have to rent an office you will likely not want after the meeting. All you have to do is rent out a personal office at a coworking space to have your meeting.

2. Reduce Stress and Anxiety Levels

Remote work or work-from-home is undeniably great. No nuisance of commuting; you can design your schedule for doing work and can also get your lawn and house in order.

Sadly, you’ll miss out on the frequent casual chat with your colleagues, little office repartees, and work trips. Remote work is more of a lonely existence and can end in feeling anxious and alone.

So, joining a coworking space will actually help you combat loneliness and anxiety by providing that human connection.

3. Flexibility & Affordability

One of the main benefits of coworking space is that you only pay according to your requirement, i.e., you don’t have to pay for the stuff you don’t need. There are rooms for a team, person, and boardrooms for when a business needs to hold a meeting.

This affordability and flexibility are great for startups that don’t have vast amounts of capital to invest in workplace facilities. The excellent arrangement can also help eliminate the high costs of renting an office and buying the necessary facilities. So, this results in the optimal use of investment capital.

4. Establishing a Healthy Work-Life Balance

Honestly, the line between life and work diminishes when working from home. From a psychological viewpoint, home is where you go to relax and rest after working the entire day. Imagine converting your home into a workplace; it can be puzzling, correct?

So, interactive coworking spaces can help you create an absolute work-life balance. First, they design your schedule so that you have a place to clock in and out of work. It means you won’t be reading and answering emails from the bedroom and then messing up your sleep pattern.

5. A Place to Learn

Those small conversations you have with the coworkers in these spaces can teach you new things daily. If you meet a fellow content writer, a social media marketer, or a graphic designer, they might share the website from which they’re recruiting clients or mention a strategy that has been doing wonders for them.

These are some little things that you miss out on when doing remote work.

Conclusion

Coworking provides several benefits to employees and the organizations they work for. It is the metro city design of the future. It would help if you had self-discipline and the above tips to increase productivity in these spaces.

Remember, choosing a suitable coworking space is essential for making all your plans pan out. Moreover, the future will probably shift more working sectors to coworking spaces, increasing market demand for flexible, close-to-home workspaces.

The evolution of companies moving to coworking spaces from conventional offices is inevitable.