The week in review: A penny for your thoughts, a view from the juggle-balcony and a new childcare offer
If we had to find a motto for the past week, it would surely be „design“. Seems likely when you are challenged with filling a 330-square-metre-space with life. What should the rooms look like? Which wall colors? Do we even want wall colors? And do grown-ups want to sleep in bunk beds??
Wait a sec, beds? For grown-ups? I thought this was a CoWORKING…
Correct, it is. But let’s be honest: How creative are you when you’ve been up since 5 am and your main topics of conversation have revolved around „peepee“, „poopie“ and „owie“? Or when you’ve spent the night at juggleHUB (we offer 24/7 access for Flex-Maxi and Fix-Maxi memberships) to finish up a presentation for an important pitch and are adding a dayshift on top? We do have good coffee, but there will surely be moments when we will take child and coffee cup from your hands and say: „Off to the nap room – we’ve got this!“. While planning our space we occasionally had the thought that our nap room could in fact be the most popular feature for our tired coworkers (acknowledging head-nodding from the parents among our readers).
Rooms with a view
There is already one “design” feature that needs no further enhancing – the view from our balconies. Sun, blooming trees, the bustling street – for the little creative coffee break in between. There are three balconies to choose from – one by the events area and two by the coworking area.
But I thought it was a CoWORKING…
Yes, yes, we’re getting to that. Between the nap room and the balconies there is lots of space to work, network, workshop, learn, talk, pitch, think, rethink, collaborate, brainstorm and surf. For this purpose we probably don’t need a lot of fancy furniture and design knick knack, but primarily room for ideas and inspiration. A clever design that motivates and supports you and your projects. We’re working on that – stay tuned.
You!
That little word was the cue for our meeting with Ninja, who will be helping us with her Service Design services. Together with her we want to try to get to know you, our customers, even better. We want to find out more about what working parents, with all their complex work and life situations, need in order to be better equipped to manage professional life, kids and day-to-day struggles. At our first meeting we recapped what juggleHUB stands for and tried to simulate what a typical day of one of our future members could look like, thus revealing weak points in our current concept.
Of course we secretly hoped that this first session with Ninja would prove our concept to be flawless as is…but we had to admit, it isn’t. We were able to pinpoint a few problems straight away, for instance the division of our coworking and childcare schedule into blocks. Too complicated, too much need for explanation – get rid of it. Now the description of our services and the different memberships is much more transparent.
We are curious to see what other pitfalls we will uncover with Ninja’s help in the coming weeks. But one thing already became very clear through this process:
Coworking with flexible childcare is uncharted territory – for us and probably for most of you as well. So let’s conquer it together!
Of course we are trying to think ahead as well as we can to create a service product that is well-rounded. But until we have opened our doors, we will not know for sure what works well and what doesn’t. When you come to work, bring your kids or not, use the nap room or not, want to work nights or not, are most productive between 9 and 12 or not, your kids enjoy the sandbox in the courtyard or not, you enjoy eating your lunch there or rather in our café area – or not.
We will make a well-informed suggestion – but what will really happen at juggleHUB in the future is largely up to you!
New: Childcare for half the price
And here is one of these offers we think will meet your needs: our „Plug & Play Dates“. Every Tuesday and Thursday morning your kids can come along to a playdate for half of the regular price. Three hours for only 15 Euros. The requirement is that a minimum of three children are registered. We can accept up to six children for each date. You are welcome to join with other parents and register as a group to benefit from our Plug-and-Play offer. If you don’t know anyone who would want to join you, feel free to come to our networking events or come by for a coffee in our café area to meet other coworkers with kids. For further information about our Plug & Play Dates and our general childcare service please check our terms of use.
What else did we learn this week?
1. We (Silvia and Katja) both have a fountain in our heads.
(Explanation: We were sort of accidentally part of a Teambuilding-Workshop. In separate teams made up of four different people. In the end each participant was asked to create a personal avatar of one other team member that they had interviewed. Result: Both of our avatars had colorful post-it and aluminium foil fountains shooting out of their heads. Open for interpretation…)
2. Are you looking for a carpenter? Go to a networking event! Do you need signage? Go to a networking event! Are you searching for a partner to give workshops on the topic „working with child“? Go to a networking event! Do you need…? Just go to a networking event!
You get the general idea…