I love to walk into Starbucks in between meetings. I think that its probably one of the best inventions next to the Smartphone. You have the ability these days to bring your work anywhere. If you need a change of scenery then you just grab your laptop and your Smartphone and away you go! The idea of working from home is nothing new, many people in some of the world’s largest corporations do it every day. My wife works for Microsoft and she does have an office but she works offsite much of the time depending on where her meetings are. No doubt technology has given us choices.
How do those choices affect customers and prospects? When you work for a big company like Microsoft and Intel you have the cloud of a big company to protect you. What if you’re a Solo-prenuer? Many people have expressed distress about being home for days on end alone. Sure you are working from home and it keeps the small business overhead down but it’s not always what it’s cracked up to be. When I first got into business, I would jump out of bed grab the laptop and work from the couch. I did fine for a while but there was a productivity curve that slowly made my work drive disappear.
I think people like me in those early days went to Starbucks to have that office like feeling. When you go grab a coffee at Starbucks, you have to get dressed, lock up the house, drive and be pleasant with people. I think that technology is great since it allows us to do whatever we want. I think that it hurts business when we don’t know how to handle these sorts of decisions.
I remember Owen Hannay from Slingshot told me that he was buying a new building downtown. He took me to this dreadful site. It was awful, but he along with developer Reed Berry completely turned that junk hole to one of the coolest buildings in the West End. It just turns out that he was also trying to lease space. When I was asked to lease space in his building I told him flat out that I didn’t need a office cause I worked from home. I will never forget his comment. He looked at me and said that once you get a office your customers look at you different and the prospects that you don’t think you can close will see you as a respectable company now. Now, bear in mind that I’m sure part of him was thinking that he needed to pay off this debt service. The other was really true. Probably 3 months after getting settled in my office I was able to close some really big contracts. My mind was completely blown.
Financially, I was not spending that much money. I was happy with what I was doing. It seems these days there are more people with “side jobs” that there has been in a long while. If you don’t believe me, stop into Starbucks at about 10am and look around. People meeting each other, people writing emails and setting schedules. It’s not all bad. It is a great way to make that first step to see if your company has any kind of legitimacy in the marketplace.
Recently, I was on my way to Starbucks and I saw a buddy of mine reading the New York Times. He was telling me about this building he has downtown. He has 10,000 square feet on the TOP floor where an ad agency used to be. His idea was to take all the Starbucks guys and give them that cloud I discussed earlier. What the Starbucks-prenuer don’t have is a conference room, fax machine, copy machine and most importantly, AN ADDRESS! My buddy Bob has solved this problem. I can’t go into the details about exactly what he is doing but I think it’s a great way for people to get an office and an address for just a little more than what they pay for coffee.
If you are one of those kinds of guys/gals that loves being remote but still feels that you are lacking on that next step. Basically what I am saying is that you can’t be with the big dogs and pee in the tall grass until you get off the porch. If you want an introduction to Bob, I would be more than happy to connect my readers with anyone that can help them grow their business.