#shiftworkspace

Recently, we decided to make a change to our primary office location and moved from our home at Innovation Depot to a new space at Shift Workspace. While we certainly enjoyed our time at Innovation Depot, there were a few specific reasons why we felt that we needed to make this change.

Community

Ultimately, when we formed CommonThread, our goal was to have a company that was visible, active and took part in the local technology community. The open-door policy and transient nature of Shift Workspace allows for that to happen. We can easily invite people to drop by and work with us and more importantly, can work downstairs with some of the most talented freelancers in the Birmingham area. Having our company behind locked doors and security made us less accessible.

Supporting the Dream

We love the idea of co-working and while we admit that the suburban-flight that occurs each day makes Birmingham not one of the more attractive places for co-working to flourish, we had a strong desire to be on the forefront of this new way of working. Other cities (Austin, San Francisco, New York, Philadelphia and Chicago) have had great success with this concept and with areas like Homewood, Bluff Park, Cahaba Heights and Highlands filled with young professionals, the opportunity is certainly there.

So, CommonThread wanted to be in a place where we could help fund this initiative and see it grow in Birmingham.

Connect the Disconnected

As the day goes on, many in the Birmingham technology community are finding a myriad of ways to connect with each other through social media and local user groups, but are rarely connecting in person to work together, share knowledge and expand their expertise. This is disappointing because most of these individuals sit just a couple of miles apart each day. Why not take a couple of days out of a week and work together? There is a completely separate blog post coming on this topic alone.

Different Companies Working Together

The beauty of the Shift Workspace arrangement is that the space for daily use is located downstairs while permanent companies have dedicated space upstairs. Since the upstairs layout is open, a community of small companies is created, allowing for people with different expertise to work together, share knowledge and help grow each other. The result is an environment that promotes new ideas over stagnation and assists small companies that do not contain within them, alone, the differing focuses of larger organizations.

Overall, Shift Workspace feels more like the home that CommonThread hoped for when we first dreamed up our company. Having the opportunity to connect with Drew Jones (who is co-author on a book about co-working in the United States) on this amazing new Birmingham work concept was something that we felt we could not pass up. We desire to see this project succeed and with a bit of effort, we think it will. I plan to write some additional articles covering more in-depth topics referencing our commitment to this way of work in the coming weeks and months.