Do you have 'anchor' members?

Business/Operations
1

It was suggested that I might find anchor members who, could they be early adopters?, who have both financial investment (a long term membership buy) but also networking/influence in bringing new members (and keep current members) to the space. This gentleman suggested going the HR route and finding private employee work at home types, but I don't feel those members will advocate for coworking; instead act primarily as a funding stream. Is that bad thing though?

Is there such thing as an anchor member? What do they look like and how do they act in your space?

Thank you - Jen

2

I’ve seen this approached a few different ways.

Sometimes people go after an anchor company thinking that a large sum of money from a single source will help stabilize things. In practice, this tends to do more damage than good and presents a big liability to the community when the coworking space relies on a single company (or any single significant source) of revenue.

But I don’t think that’s what you’re asking here - you’re asking about anchor individuals. This is absolutely key!

Think of anchor members as the people in your community who lead by example. They may prepay membership, but they’re invested in other ways as well. Instead of thinking about demographics (work from home vs freelancers vs startup entrepreneurs), think about looking for people who share a similar long-term goal as you. This comes from sharing the “why” behind your coworking space. I wrote this post about Indy Hall’s why LONG after we opened, but it’s based on the same kinds of conversations I was having with people before we opened.

The people in our community who I think of as anchor members are the ones who are on the look out for problems, and instead of complaining, help solve them.

The people in our community who I think of as anchor members are the ones who notice new people, introduce themselves, and make them feel welcome (so it’s not all dependent on our staff).

The people in our community who I think of as anchor members are the first ones to pitch in when somebody asks for help.

People who pre-pay are great (we’re doing a big membership prepayment drive right now, our biggest ever, and I’ll be writing more about that soon). But if you think about the opening of your coworking space more like a barn raising and less like opening an office, or starting a service business, you’ll end up with a far more productive and sustainable result.

If you haven’t seen it before, check out Simon Sinek’s “Start with Why” (he has a book by the same title, but the 18 minute talk has most of what you need) and a few other posts I’ve collected on mobilizing community members:

-Alex

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On Thu, Aug 20, 2015 at 10:26 AM, Jennifer Kready [email protected] wrote:

It was suggested that I might find anchor members who, could they be early adopters?, who have both financial investment (a long term membership buy) but also networking/influence in bringing new members (and keep current members) to the space. This gentleman suggested going the HR route and finding private employee work at home types, but I don’t feel those members will advocate for coworking; instead act primarily as a funding stream. Is that bad thing though?

Is there such thing as an anchor member? What do they look like and how do they act in your space?

Thank you - Jen

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3

Alex, thanks for sharing the 'why' parts of your email. I've been working on updating values, mission and vision for Collective Agency with staff and members and your blog post is super-helpful as an example.

Is anyone else here working on this?

Alex Linsker, Collective Agency, Portland Oregon

4

At The Guild we have an anchor company, but we have a) got them signed up on a long contract, b) knew them already so we knew they’d fit in- in fact some of our own rhythms and rituals were adapted from what they did when we shared their office while originally building The Guild, and c) have added in the risk of them leaving to our forecasts so we don’t get taken by surprise if they do move on (this kind of thing is what our new management accountant has been helping us with).

We also have founder members- this is fairly informal, but when we opened we had a founder plan (full time members who didn’t have a dedicated desk, at a lifetime discount rate we offered for a period after we opened). We don’t currently offer a full time membership of this type all at, so those grandfathered in tend to be the elders. They are most likely to understand the community ethos, keep an eye out for new people, report any issues to the helpdesk, and we don’t have to twist their arms too much to come to Town Hall!

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On Thursday, 20 August 2015 15:26:00 UTC+1, Jennifer Kready wrote:

It was suggested that I might find anchor members who, could they be early adopters?, who have both financial investment (a long term membership buy) but also networking/influence in bringing new members (and keep current members) to the space. This gentleman suggested going the HR route and finding private employee work at home types, but I don’t feel those members will advocate for coworking; instead act primarily as a funding stream. Is that bad thing though?
Is there such thing as an anchor member? What do they look like and how do they act in your space?

Thank you - Jen

5

I have had periods when we did not have anchors, and periods when we did. The presence or absence of anchor members can absolutely change the vibe within the space so it is well to choose them with some care.

If your space and approach allow for permanent memberships with dedicated space, this is where your anchors end up; or at least, i have never had an anchor who was not a fulltime member with a dedicated space. I think it is possible but have not yet experienced it so I can’t talk about that.

The first anchor in Kamer52 was coincidentally a psychologist. (I would like to say I did this intentionally as I advise others to do but the truth is that I bumble my way into almost everything, and into this also). Because she was there, we found that in an organic way other people in the healthcare/mental health sector were attracted to us – so think broadly, in terms of mindfullness, wellness, food and food supplements, and so on. This continued on as she moved and other who had previously been part time members, moved up to full time.

Then because of some local development (the city built a medical center dedicated to this sector) this cluster of folks pretty much went away. This was startling and is one of the downsides of having an anchor; though the coworkers we had who moved there have at least in part remained connected with us. This and some other things led to our explorations in the area of the intersection between webshops/internet businesses and our space. So we pivoted to try this out, and are still tinkering with it. In general it has been a wildly positive experience, but the problem of the sprawling and messy nature of logistics (packing, returns, et cetera) for webshops has not been entirely solved.

In general the best anchors are the ones who think of coworkng as a decision they have made, not as a temporary solution until they get big enough to have a “real” office space. To a large extent they do set the tone for the space for everybody else and in some ways the community begins to revolve around them.

We had a period when the dominant presence was private employee work at home types, most were moms with a part time gig. It was a friendly, cheery, “escape” kind of vibe during that time. But I would not qualify them as anchors, as they did not appear regularly enough for that. It did spin off into an anchor group, which still meets here once a month though most of the folks in the group only irregularly work here now.

Sorry if this is disjointed, I am really badly jetlagged today and also avoiding my inbox. :slight_smile:

Cheers,

Jeannine

6

Thank you! I’m sharing with my FB cowork community and we’re discussing why and ways of doing this.

Jen