I’ve been trying to lay out the workings of a continual “movable jelly”. A jelly is a coworking event where strangers congregate at the invitation of a host. If you haven’t heard of this, check it out.
The movable jelly is intended to take advantage of places not well-suited to 8-hour mass sit-ins (most coffee shops) and establish a successful routine for coworkers. I’ve also called this habit “mezzanining”, because the upper floor of delis have seemed ideal for this kind of congregating
The objectives of this kind of coworking:
- change the isolated worker’s experience of public spaces from something unfamiliar and and work-averse to something familiar, communal and work-friendly
- encourage and grow the physical and virtual coworking community
- establish work practices as an observable common activity in that place
The solution: on any particular day to have a simple string of coworkers who virtually pass the baton to each other and, through both virtual and physical signals, acknowledge each other and validate each other’s presence and intent.
What you need: a decently sized space, wi-fi, online check-in system, tolerant staff, and coworking participants.
Participants check in both physically and virtually. Both check-ins should allow a level of discretion–only people who know what to look for will recognize it, and it’s easily removable.
How does it work:
- A person pre-advertises the jelly at a public place. (optional)
- A person announces he is checked in at a usable place by:
- Buying something at the place (if it sells things)
- Checking in physically by placing a physical symbol in view that he’s coworking. For example, I imagine a simple binder clip at the top of the laptop, with the legs flipped up for openness, down for privacy. A business card may show even more openness.
- Checking in via the internet, announcing his location to other coworkers, with whatever details he thinks to share about himself or the venue. d. Acknowledging those coworkers around him (as a courtesy). New arrivals should understand that a person may be in privacy mode. The physical and virtual status indicators should communicate that preference.
- Others check the status of coworkers around the neighborhood, determining where to go. Wherever they check in, they follow step4. After a reasonable stay, each user moves on picking a new venue (either joining an existing jelly or forming a new one) and repeating step 1.
- At all times, each coworker respects the rules of the venue:
- Buy something
- Stay only a reasonable time
- Unplug the power cord if asked to do so
- Leave if asked to do so (remembering nothing is personal and there are more jellies waiting)
Ideally, workers become comfortably `peripatetic’ and enjoy better flow and productivity than they would being isolated at home or in public.
As an epilogue, after the day is done, some semi-official rep could contact the proprietor, letting her know the session’s traffic, revenue, and comments from the coworkers and inviting her to schedule something more formal.
The Movable Jelly method accomplishes:
- identifying new spaces for coworking
- changing the uses of that space to include coworking
- building a community of peripatetic coworkers
P.S. What can you accomplish in an hour or so? Well, I can point to Merlin Mann’s Procrastination Hack.
