After listening to to the Nomad community and reviewing the Office Nomads membership levels, we are excited to announce the introduction of the Advocate membership.  The idea is simple: provide an easy, low-cost way to be supported by and participate in the Office Nomads community.

Advocate membership is $30/month and includes one visit per month as well as all the usual perks of an Office Nomads membership. What this means is that you will be able to participate in the Office Nomads mailing list, attend any of the community events in the space, and you can proclaim from the mountain tops that you are a Nomad. This is the perfect sort of membership for individuals who are not able to come to Office Nomads regularly but still would like to be connected to our community.

Adjusting our membership offerings in response to community demand is important to us. If you have any thoughts, ideas or questions, please get in touch!

“If you’ve taken the leap (or been pushed) out of a supported company-based employment, or work from home for whatever reason, you might miss that office life and culture that is so fun and even inspiring. Office Nomads offers it in spades, on your terms.” – Charlie

Photo credit: Trina Gadsden 2012

Several months ago, a group of Nomads gathered and discussed the culture here at Office Nomads. We talked about what helps contribute to the culture of our coworking space, and how those elements interact with one another. It was a fantastic exercise, and one we plan to go through again and again as our coworking community grows and changes over time.

After our discussion, we made up a quick chart of the threads of our coworking culture:

Do you run a coworking space? Are you a part of a coworking space? What do you think contributes to the culture of your space? Share your thoughts here!

2011. What a wonderful year for coworking at Office Nomads! Here are 10 highlights of a fabulous year on Capitol Hill:

1. We searched and searched for a great place to open a Northend Office Nomads. While we didn’t find the perfect fit, we did connect with a great community of coworkers, and are continuing to keep our eyes open for an opportunity for a Northend space.
2. From building bikes that can survive in harsh rural African conditions to helping folks find clinical trials they can take part in, our members accomplished great things this year. They also contributed some fantastic things to the office, including fancy-shmancy signage. Office Nomads members, you guys rule.
3. There were pranks. Many pranks.
4. We geeked out on our own member data.
5. We celebrated Coworking Day on August 9th in Seattle, alongside of celebrations happening worldwide.
6. Jacob made us a Twitter Box!
7. We all got to work in different ways.
8. Nomads shared all the different ways they worked to negotiate their memberships with their bosses. This not only was really interesting to hear about, but has helped other Nomads (and coworkers around the world) negotiate coworking memberships of their own.
9. We got our travel on! Office Nomads represented at a variety of events around the country and the world, including Austin, Berlin, and LA.
10. Most importantly, we rounded out our awesome team with the addition of the absolutely fabulous Chelsea McClain. We could not be more excited to have her as a part of the Office Nomads team!

And that just about rounds it out. What an incredible year! Thanks to all of the Nomads, our friends, and our families for making Office Nomads all that it is.

Chelsea & Alex, community cultivating rockstars

See you all in 2012!

Jacob and I regularly survey our members so we can learn more about their experiences at Office Nomads and with coworking. We analyze this data to help us create a coworking space that truly works for our members, and to ensure that we have our finger on the pulse of what makes our space work. We recognize there is a lot of value in sharing this information, so today we thought we’d post some interesting tidbits we’ve learned from our experience creating Office Nomads! Here are a few points we’ve pulled from two of our surveys: a Coworking Survey completed by members who have been with us for two months or more, and an Exit Survey of members who choose to end their membership at Office Nomads. Both of these are ongoing so the data changes over time and requires regular analysis. Each survey, as of June 2011, has been filled out by approximately 45 individuals.

Why do members come to Office Nomads?
It is a common misconception that individuals seek out membership at a coworking space because they need to share resources like the internet, coffee, or a fax machine. Through our experience starting Office Nomads, we’ve learned that individuals come to a coworking space as more of a lifestyle (or perhaps “workstyle”) choice as opposed to a services choice. Here’s a chart taken from our Coworking Survey results:

We think this makes it pretty clear that independent and mobile workers today don’t need more places just to plop down their laptops and get to work. What they need is a simple platform that enables an in-person connection with others during their workdays.

Some ideas about why they stay
What brings new members to our doors is not necessarily what is going to encourage them to maintain their membership at Office Nomads. We try to get a sense of what benefits our members experience by being a part of Office Nomads.

• 2/3 of surveyed members report they have seen an increase in their productivity since joining Office Nomads.
• 81% of surveyed members think of Office Nomads as a place where they “can meet and connect with potential collaborators for work.”
• 83% of surveyed members report their “work/life balance is healthier than it was before [they] joined Office Nomads.”
• 72% of surveyed members tell us their familiarity and knowledge of the Capitol Hill neighborhood (where Office Nomads is located) has increased since becoming a member of Office Nomads.

Why do they leave?
Part of being responsible coworking space owners is figuring out not only what brings new members to our doors, but trying to understand why members walk away. Attrition rates can only tell us how many people walk out the door, so we appreciate getting candid feedback when members depart.

The exit survey has been an invaluable tool because we can keep an eye out for red flags that do require our attention. But not every member who joins finds coworking to be the solution for them.  In fact, the exit survey process gives us an opportunity to make recommendations about where people might find a better fit. I’d recommend any coworking space operator to survey the folks who end their membership.

And now a few questions: If you own/operate a coworking space, does this data jive with what you’ve learned from your members? If you’re a coworking space user, does our membership data resonate with the reasons you’ve chosen to work out of a coworking space? Let us know – we’re curious! We’re taking all we’ve learned here in Capitol Hill and are trying to apply it to creating another space – you can read more about that process on our grow page.

Thanks to all who were able to make it out to the first meetup about the opening of our second coworking space. It was great to see some new faces along with some current members, and to get to hear more about what folks are looking for when it comes to building our next coworking community.

Hosting meetups such as we did last night is an important step in the early days of any coworking space. Not only is it important for us to provide a space for members of the community to give recommendations and pose requests for how the space will work, but  there is huge value in creating a way for members to actually get involved in the process. As we’ve said before, people support what they help to create. We hope that folks who are interested in this earlier phase will join us to go visit spaces, continue to brainstorm with us as we develop the plans for the space, and get to know other members before we open the doors to the next space.

If you missed the event, never fear – the next one will be soon! And as always, if you have any suggestions, feedback, or recommendations to make, drop us an e-mail at grow AT officenomads DOT com so we can get you in the conversation.

Today’s current standings from our Neighborhood Campaign are as follows:

1. Ballard
2. Fremont
3. Greenlake / U-District (a tie!)
4. Columbia City
5. West Seattle

Thanks to all who have sent us their feedback thus far! If you wish your neighborhood was in the #1 place, be sure to get your vote in!  We’ll be keeping the polls open through the end of the  year, and are excited to hear where it is you’d love to see our next coworking space.

Oh and hey! Did you see the piece the Seattle Times did on coworking in Seattle? It’s a great article – you should read it!

Have you heard? Office Nomads is looking to open another coworking space in Seattle!  At our three year anniversary party, we took the opportunity to let folks know about our plans, and even created a fancy-shmancy web page to go along with it.

We’re incredibly excited about the opportunity of opening another space, and bringing coworking to another one of Seattle’s great neighborhoods. We’ve had an incredible time creating Office Nomads for the last three years, and are eager to kick-start another platform on which another incredible coworking community can grow.

You can read a whole bunch about our intentions around the second space by heading to the Grow Page and downloading one or both PDFs which overview our business and financial plans. We are in the beginning phases of the process, and are working hard to gather the necessary funds to open as well as reaching out to various communities to hear more about what they’d like to see in a coworking space.

For a couple of weeks now, we’ve been asking for community feedback on where we should open said second space. Here are some initial results in order of popularity:

1. Ballard
2. Fremont
3. University District
4. Green Lake
5. Belltown / Columbia City / West Seattle
6. Uptown (Lower Queen Anne)
7. Queen Anne
8. Georgetown
9. Magnolia
10. Wallingford

Wish you saw your neighborhood higher on the list? Well get your voice heard by heading over to the Grow Page and submitting your preference. Be sure to drop your e-mail address in the contact field so we can keep you posted on our progress.

Have other feedback for us?  Drop us an email via grow AT officenomads DOT com and we’ll be happy to start a conversation with you.

Seattle Night Owls, we hear you! We’re excited to announce that Office Nomads will now be offering extended hours every Thursday! Our office will be staffed and open until midnight each Thursday, starting October 7th.  How great is that?  Membership rates are the same and managed the same way (non-resident members sign in when they get here). This will help out those folks who can’t get to the office early enough or who work best when it’s dark outside.

This is just a trial that we’re running until the end of the year. If all goes well with these first couple of months, we’ll look to make it a permanent staple of our offerings.

Have any questions?  Interested if it’d be right for you?  Drop us an email and we’ll be happy to help you out.

Thank you to Flickr user mrhayata for use of the great owl photo!

Lisa Grossman

Member Since: August 2010

Type of Member: Part-Time 10

Lisa couldn’t pick her favorite planet, much less a favorite solar system.  They were all fascinating in their own right and it was impossible to decide which one she would focus on for the rest of her career as an astronomer. It had been her dream, ever since she had learned about the possibility of alien life, to be an astronomer or, to be more exact, an alien hunter.  Unfortunately, such a career path required a specificity that she didn’t want.  Instead Lisa took her Astronomy degree from Cornell and went to UC Santa Cruz where they turn recovering scientists into journalists.

That is how we now find Lisa.  She is a science writer who educates the masses on new research in physics and astronomy in a manner that is interesting and accessible.  While at UC Santa Cruz she spent time interning at The Santa Cruz Sentinel, SLAC National Accelerator Lab and Wired.com. After graduating in 2009, she did some writing for New Scientist and Science News.

Now she has found her way to a new city and new job. “Right now, I think I am living the dream,” she admits.  “I just wanted to write about space for anybody, anywhere.  Just get it out there.”  Wired Science knew Lisa and her work and has picked her up as a full-time writer.   Now Wired.com features regular postings by Lisa.  If you see something regarding space on the website, good chance the byline has her name.

Lisa is an excellent addition to ON.  Collectively, we do a pretty good job of nerding-out over anything science or technology related.  It’s pretty neat to have someone here working for one to the biggest technology sites.  Add to that the fact that she likes board games, hiking and skiing and we’re over the moon for her.

Maybe it’s a bit of a flashback for Lisa and her summer at Johns Hopkins’ Center for Talented Youth. “A nerd camp based on 7^th grade SATs,” Lisa explained.  “All the kids at the camp had an extra geeky side to them that wasn’t being expressed at home so this was a fun, safe space to be nerdy.”  Does that sound at all like Office Nomads to anyone else?

Lisa, we’re so glad you found us and are thrilled to have you on board as a Nomad!