Yes, three posts in a week inspired by Charlie Munger, who said:
“Take a simple idea and take it seriously”
I know that in the past I have been guilty of having an idea I really believe in, but then putting it to one side as it seemed too simple. Let Charlie’s words be a reminder to me, and let me give you one example today.
Work Near Home (WNH) Hubs
In Autumn 2020, right in the middle of the pandemic, I started working with a new client, a boutique professional services firm based in South London. As we started shaping up the future of the firm, we looked at where their staff actually lived and what their commutes were into the firm’s office before the firm went remote due to the lockdowns. It turned out that they had people coming from various points on the map with commutes up to 90 minutes each way. We then looked at a firm offering adjacent services that they collaborated with often, and they too had a similar shape of commuting. By that time (early 2021), I had moved to the southern edge of London and was riding my bike around the area a lot to get to know the geography and what was there in the various towns and villages. One thing I found was a number of sets of farm buildings close to the M25 orbital motorway that had been converted into spaces for businesses to operate from, which makes so much sense. Low cost of rent, easy proximity to the transport network (both by motor vehicle and with train stations nearby).
I then suggested to the client, who was already considering closing their office and going fully remote, that they could partner with a couple of other adjacent firms they collaborate within their broad area and create several smaller hubs where a few people from each firm who live close by could come to work in an office environment but without the longer commute to a central office for each firm. I imagined them sticking pins on a map for all the employees of three firms and then finding spots for about three or four hubs that could mean that nobody has to commute more than about fifteen minutes from their home.
Oh, and I wrote a long piece about this over two and a half years ago in “A vision of a 15 minute workplace“, so this idea is still sticking with me. Perhaps time for me to take it seriously!
To go back to the specific idea of hubs set up for a few firms partnering together, I saw many benefits to this simple idea, including:
- Supporting Staff, by providing office space for those who do not have space at home to work remotely or simply prefer to work outside their home. In the rush to have more and more people work from home (WFH), I see that too little attention is given to those for whom this is not possible or optimal, so caring employers offering space out of the home but nearer home can be a real positive for employees and the business.
- Building Community, by creating a space for people who all lived close to each other to work and connect. In a world where the sense of local community has largely dissipated, I sense it can be powerful to have people work and mingle with people in a space where they know everyone lives locally.
- Maintaining Privacy, by creating a hub that is used by people from their own and partner businesses, rather than simply having staff go to hot desks at co-working spaces. BTW, my mind is often boggled by people working on confidential documents on laptops on public transport, or even (and yes, I’ve witnessed this) lawyers on confidential calls on trains!
- Ease of set up. If a small group of firms got together and needed space for their staff in a series of hubs, from my experience with commercial real estate leasing I know that it would be far easier to quickly lease, set up and operate a series of consistent work hubs that looking to create a consistent experience by using various co-working spaces (such as I recently talked about in “Would you WNH?“
I am convinced that WNH is a wave of the near future, plus that the collaborative hub creation idea is a simple one that will be easily deployed and create benefits for businesses, employees and communities.
I will not be operating these myself, but I would be open to investing in and/or advising an entrepreneur ready to do this. If this is you, talk to me!