- Rose Rivera
- May 1, 2024
This year’s Global Coworking Unconference Conference (GCUC) took the PilotoMail team to Salt Lake City, Utah for a jam-packed event with voices ranging from Wayne Berger, the CEO of IWG The Americas, to indie operators and community managers from across the globe. The event spotlighted the evolving dynamics of the coworking industry, tackling subjects from innovative scaling strategies to the critical importance of community building. The expert-led panels were rich with insights on leveraging technology to streamline operations, boost member engagement, and improve retention rates.
Our 3 main takeaways from the event
Talent & Tech, why are our biggest strengths our biggest weaknesses?
On a panel discussing scaling strategies for the modern operator, Arian Lewis, the moderator and CEO/Founder of Kiln, engaged in dialogue with industry leaders such as Paula Mercer, Vice President of Vast Coworking Group; Miro Miroslavov, CEO at OfficeRnD; and Sean Donahue, Managing Director of Colab Inspired by Somerset Development, exploring the challenges of company experience. During the discussion, there was one thing everyone agreed on: the importance of talent. Whether it’s finding, hiring, retaining, and ensuring they’re the best fit, the quest for talent is a struggle every company faces. This dilemma affects coworking operators in particular, where your talent not only fosters community but also manages administrative tasks and represents your brand. As Arian emphasized: teams need dreamers, visionaries, executors, and consistent people.
When it comes to technology, figuring out the best solutions to serve your members can feel overwhelming, from choosing coworking management systems to handling mail and access keys. This challenge can be particularly daunting when you are just starting out. Miro Miroslavov offers a new perspective: AI can serve as a copilot for the operation side of coworking. Plus, having and securing a team that is not scared of technology, but eager to implement and adapt new programs and tools can change the trajectory of your space. After all, teams do need visionaries that are ready to execute, regardless of challenges.
Measuring lasting communities - it's a science for all
Whether you have just started on your coworking journey or have years of experience with dozens of locations, retention and engagement are what unite all operators. What if you could measure exactly what works, and, most importantly, what doesn’t? Anna Squires Levine, Chief Commercial Officer at Industrious, tells us that for them, retention is a science. When measuring the NPS (Net Promoter Score) per location, they realized that a higher NPS did not equal a higher retention rate. This poses the thought: your members can be happy with your services, and they can still leave. What other moments and experiences can you offer to ensure retention success? Retention doesn’t need to be a science in your space, maybe some of these situations and outcomes can be intuitive to smaller operators. However, the data presented shows this: when you enhance the value of spending time in your space, members are less likely to leave.
Hold on to what brought you here
As a global movement, coworking is on the rise everywhere. According to projections by Statista, there will be 41,000 coworking spaces across the globe by the end of 2024. This surge in popularity reflects the many reasons why individuals enter the coworking industry. For some, it was a new venture; for others, it was a means to utilize existing space. And for many, it’s a mix of various motivations that lead them to coworking. As Alexandra Livesey, Chief Operations Officer at Clockwise, advises, holding onto these initial motivations is crucial— it’s your secret sauce, your driver and motivator. What brought you into this community is what makes your brand special and positions you for success in an era where flexible work models and shared workspaces are becoming the norm.
Hospitality is what makes coworking stand out in the vast space that is commercial real estate. It’s your teams, the way you carry your brands, and the challenges you continue to overcome that make the industry what it is. Fifteen years ago, what we now know as household names were mere ideas from people who dared to build for the future. From the science-backed retention strategies at Industrious to the team-centered approaches of spaces like Kiln, brands are not created in a vacuum. Your space is home to a vibrant community because you have put in the work, and that’s what makes coworking such a special place to be.
About PilotoMail
PilotoMail is a mail management platform that creates recurring revenue streams for mailrooms through postal mail handling automation, and virtual mailboxes for the remote workforce. Property managers, coworking spaces, mail centers & registered agents can handle large volumes of mail efficiently, comply with all postal regulations, and increase revenue from their existing footprint effortlessly.