Coworking month driving collaboration in the Vale

Creative Rural Communities’ coworking project aims to drive social and economic development in the Vale by changing ways of working and fostering a spirit of collaboration.

15 June, 2021 

Following the success of ‘Cowork-Local’ in May we caught up with Rhys Burton, Senior Rural Regeneration Officer, to find out more.

Can you tell us a little about your Coworking Festival? Has it been a success?

"Cowork-Local was our way of celebrating and promoting the use of coworking spaces in the Vale’s rural towns and communities for a month, beginning in May. It's part of a broader European project that hopes to gather and launch diverse spaces where people can work closer to home, reducing the need for residents living in rural areas to commute. 

"At the start of the month we launched an online platform which allowed people to compare the spaces available to work from and book a desk directly. This was a big moment for the team after almost two years working on this project. 

"Our goal is to build a new habit for people as they consider their style of working post-Covid and this felt like the perfect time to go for a big push. Before the pandemic there were 60,000 people commuting out of the Vale each day. The environmental impact of this is huge. Now feels like the time to challenge people not to go back to that way of working."

How have you and your team been working to support businesses and community enterprises in the rural Vale?  

"First and foremost, I like to think we're helping them build an understanding of the project. We work with the stakeholders on either side of the equation. For those thinking about setting themselves up as co-working venues, we help them understand what’s required. We have spoken to pubs, community venues, sports clubs as well as existing business sites with unused space. We've helped them with practicalities like taking bookings, arranging high speed internet access and cleaning, and put them in touch with some of the smaller businesses and entrepreneurs in the Vale who would make up their client group.  

"In some cases, for the Festival, we helped fund improvements to the venues such as door entry systems, or Covid compliance equipment with small grants. In others we are able to loan items of furniture to get spaces up and running. 

"The monthly coworking forum we established online has also proved a real success. What’s great in the Vale is that our current venues don’t see each other as competitors. They are all unique spaces and they recognise that people want variety of spaces to work from and so is a mutual benefit to them all being successful. This leads to them sharing tips on the forum on setting up spaces, producing welcome packs and so on. This speaks volumes about the culture we are creating. 

"And for those thinking about co-working we help them understand what this actually means. It is more than hot-desking. It is about growing communities. The best spaces are ones where independent businesses collaborate together to allow them to take on bigger projects. As well as bringing them success this helps enhance the economic base of the Vale."

What impact has the pandemic had on your work?

"It's had a big impact. This project has been running since before I joined in 2019. The plan had been to initially focus on one co-working location, in Llantwit Major, and after running some evening sessions there early last year we were working towards the first full days in May 2020. Then Covid came and totally changed the scope of the project. 

"The ethos within CRC is to try to be the gel within communities. What we saw once Covid hit was a complete change in how these communities functioned when everyone was working at home. We don’t see people ever returning fully to their old routines. People are now thinking ‘I could work a couple of hours somewhere near to home in the morning, miss the rush, and then go to the office’. Now is the time to look creatively at how our future should be. So we extended our scheme and in 2021 launched it with nine coworking venues across the Vale."

And what is next for the project?

"Post-covid we can see lots of organisations rethinking office space. It may be that some locations are used just for team time rather than a place to work all day. There may be some who choose to close their offices altogether. If this happens, we will have even more potential clients for venues in the Vale. 

"For lots of people working at home is great, up to a point. Most of us from time to time need the social connectivity that comes from working around others. It is also important for our mental and physical wellbeing to get out of the house. For many the option to work somewhere away from their home but not in their main office is a nice middle ground. This is something we will be exploring.

"Perhaps there is also now the  opportunity to discuss the relevance of coworking for us as a pioneering authority so that we can consider the lessons and practices that might be adopted internally and for us to shape the ‘new normal’ and our evolving work culture.     

"Providing more information for employers is also going to be a focus for us. Their understanding of how coworking works is just as important as it is for employees, perhaps more so. We need big employers to give their staff permission to work in this way, and to do that we need to help them see the wider benefits and potential for collaboration that come with it. 

"And personally, I'm really looking forward to working with more social enterprises and local business as our stakeholders. Before I was in this role I knew the geography of the Vale but not the communities that make it. The project has really allowed me to get to know the communities and the key people in a number of organisations and who are our community partners.  My passion is helping people trial new things and innovate. To be able to do this at a community level is really rewarding."

Find our more about coworking in the Vale and some of the spaces available on the Cowork Local website - https://www.coworklocal.co.uk/