The next time you come into Office Nomads, make sure you make a beeline to Susan’s desk.  You lift an eyebrow and ask me why.  Well, it’s not her wit or her thoughtful commentary (although those are pretty great, too) that makes me suggest you stop by there, but more for Buckley.

Buckley is Susan’s 5-month-old black lab.  He is a solid 35 pounds of cuteness.  Now, don’t think of a stereotypical bouncing black lab when you picture this guy. Mellow is an excellent way to describe him.  ‘Adorable’ works, too.  He likes to laze about the office, taking full advantage of Office Nomad’s open napping policy. Usually he happily wanders up when called, plops down on his bottom and shows off his big brown eyes until people give in and scratch his head.  He’s a pro and will reduce you in no time into one of those people whose voice jumps a couple octaves and makes funny faces as you pet him.  Great entertainment is tossing a tennis ball for him and watching him prance and pounce his way to the ball until he scoops it up and trots back.  A true lab, this one.

It’s easy to see that this is a budding puppy food model we have here.  If that job doesn’t pan out then he is open to being a food tester, mainly for the meat industry.  Young Buckley, or Buck if you’re comfortable, is a major outdoor enthusiast.  He enjoys long walks along the waterfront and weekends at his country home in the North Cascades.  This young stud is single but isn’t looking for anything serious.  If you want to stop by and shower him with love for only a short period of time, he would be thrilled.

And that, everyone, is our new adorably fantastic Nomad.  His full name is Sir Buckley Danger Dog, but you can call him Buckley.

Kevin Moore

Website: www.kevinmooreconsulting.com

Member Since: January 2010

Type of Member: Resident

When most people are nine, they are mastering the early squiggles of cursive writing and are confident that their urges to eat paste are well gone in their past. At the wee age of nine, Kevin Moore was already tapping away at a keyboard in the early stages of his programming career.  By the time he was in high school he was doing professional web development. A visit to a career fair in college led to an internship at Microsoft, which blossomed to a career, which was a step along the way to his current freelance software consulting.  He was lucky enough to figure out what he liked doing early on and has been able to make a career out of it.

Kevin is a new addition to Office Nomads and he is fitting in perfectly. He became familiar with ON after participating in Green Drinks and Sustainable Capitol Hill. Every entrance and exit he makes in the space involves a fist pound with other Nomads. He’s a positive addition to the space, sharing his James Brown with everyone and enthusiastically joining in on the fun when we’ve gone to Happy Hour or had other events.  There are rumors that he has a singing and music background and we are eagerly anticipating the day when he decided to share that with us.

Like many other Nomads, Kevin is a bit of a world traveler.   This summer he is off to explore Argentina and Peru.  Lucky for him, his business is mobile so in between the tango dancing and exploration of ruins he can continue his freelance software consulting business, Kevin Moore Consulting.  We all are eagerly anticipating his reports on eating cuy (guinea pig) and drinking chicha (corn beer).

We are thrilled to have Kevin at Office Nomads.  Not just because he has the magically ability of fixing our computers just by looking at them, but because he is a pretty stellar individual.

Wow! The January Open House was a great time!  Thanks to everyone who stopped by.  It was great to see everyone and catch up.

For those of you who missed out, I understand the weather was rather terrible that evening.  But, you missed out on some pretty spectacular fun.  Josh, from Bluebird Ice Cream, scooped out some incredible ice cream for everyone to try.  He very quickly ran out of the vegan coconut mint chocolate chip and there was a good reason why.  I had no idea vegan ice cream could be so fantastic!  The Stumptown ice cream and the snickerdoodle were also really delicious and it was all finished off by the time the night came to a close.    Mychal Richardson’s photography was a great conversation piece and had many people quietly going from one photo to the next reading about how each individual pictured fought for their rights.  I think we all came away inspired.  See more of his work on his website or stop by and check them out!

A big thanks must also go to Andy Aupperlee of Explosion 5000.  He took over the Green Room and shot portraits of our Open House attendees and their New Years Resolutions.  The results are rather amazing and you should make sure to read about it on his website and look at his Flickr page.

A big thanks to all of you who could come out.  Hopefully see you all at our next Open House!

Thanks to Flickr user Sukanto Debnath for use of the above photo through the Creative Commons License

It’s January so that means it’s time for our January Open House!  Fitting, right?  Well, we are really excited for this month’s open house on January 14th from 6 PM to 9 PM when we’ll open our doors to the wholecommunity to celebrate art, coworking and each other.

What: January Open House

When: Thursday, January 14th from 6 PM-9 PM

Where: Office Nomads- 1617 Boylston Ave, Second Floor

Food and Drink: We’ve got the goods, just bring your pint glass!

We are proud to be part of Capitol Hill Art Walk again this month and are featuring the beautiful photography of Mychal Richardson of Lost Photography.  His show, “Faces of Washington” was created for the ACLU and includes seventeen 36″ by 36″ black and white portraits of courageous individuals from all across Washington State who fought for their rights and the rights of others.  It is an inspiring show and one not to be missed.

Something we are very excited about is the opportunity to be part of the art!  Andy Aupperlee of Explosion 5000 will be here taking photos of you and your New Years Resolutions.  Andy is really excited to have some fun with these photography so bring a big smile and your creativity to be expressed in the photobooth.  At the same time, we have partnered with a couple local businesses in an effort to tempt you away from some of those New Years Resolutions. Ice cream from Bluebird Ice Cream and beer from Elysian Brewing always are incredibly delicious and will both be here.  Make sure your bring a sweet tooth and your pint glass!

The only thing that could make the Open House any greater would be you!  We hope you can join us and bring along your great friends and family.  What better way to celebrate winter, photography and the neighborhood than with our community?  We look forward to seeing you!

Office Nomads is in the midst of some end-of-the-year reviewing, plotting and planning. Part of the process this year included our first-ever Member Survey. After two years of coworking in Seattle, we’ve had a lot of informal feedback and have drawn some basic conclusions about what our members like and dislike. But we decided it was about time to ask them for their suggestions.  Their rants and raves.  In their words.

The results were fantastic. Our members  provided us with some excellent hard data on what makes our coworking space work, as well as some great feedback on what we can be doing better. Here are three big takeaways:

• We’ve said it before, but now we have some data to back it up: it’s all about the people.  When asked about the thing that members appreciate most about being at Office Nomads, they replied nearly in unison that it is the people that make it great. We can now say things like “the proof’s in the pudding.”  Well, maybe we can’t.  I’m not really sure what that means, actually.
• Our members are interested in figuring out even more ways to share resources (including people-powered resources such as bookkeepers and admin assistants), and pass business to one another.  From recommendations of even more way to highlight what it is that each of our members do, the Nomads spoke out loud and clear that they want to help one another out as much as possible.
• Working in community means being human.  When asked what our members would like to see improved, several of the responses revolved around typical shared space gripes: being mindful of one another when on long (and loud) phone conversations, remembering to do the dishes, cleaning up after one’s self.  These frustrations came as no surprise; we all take turns being more of a distraction than we normally are, forget to do a dish now and again, and decide to not replace the toilet paper roll when it runs out.  We’re all human. These challenges (while very real and requiring quick and responses by us as business owners) demonstrate another part of being in a community with one another.  It is about our members working towards the best way to work successfully with one another.

Our members continue to humble us with their thoughtfulness, willingness to help us make the business better, and spectacular senses of humor.  So with that, here are some of our favorite quotes from members:

“I feel like Office Nomads is saving my business. The isolation was killing my attitude and creativity. Thanks to Office Nomads I am not confusing my clients with my social opportunities (not as chatty, not as ‘charitable’ with my billing ), I have closer ties with downtown clients. I am quite productive at Office Nomads because everyone is there to get things done, not socialize all the time. A+ guys, really.”

“There is a lot of small business know-how which could be shared more.  The brown bags are a good start.  And the email list is good for the occasional recommendation query.
Maybe we could occasionally collect and share links to public stuff people are working on?  Blogs, artwork, trip photos, …  I feel like there’s a lot of creative work going on but I’m missing a lot of it because I can’t get to happy hour due to other commitments.  Maybe a “shameless self promotion” email list?”

“I just sat here for five minutes trying to think of something which I’d like to change which I actually want you to take on.  There are big “nice to haves” like more light in the cafe area, but I actually don’t want you to busy yourselves with big projects which I don’t think are worth the effort when things are running smoothly.
So, I guess if I have to choose then I’d like everyone to have free ponies.  With wings.”

Wow.  Thanks everyone.  We hear you!  Thanks for helping us continue to breathe new life into the business.

(In case you were wondering,  I used Google Forms to complete our survey, which was an absolute breath of fresh air after struggling with Survey Monkey. Thank goodness for Google’s helpful new tools, which bring together Google’s simplicity and exciting analysis capabilities. It saved me time, effort, and endless frustration.

In total, we had 22 members fill our our survey, representing several membership types including Basics, Residents, and those who have been Pink Slip Scholarship recipients.)

Thanks to Flickr user tonamel for use of the photo above under the Creative Commons license.

Trevor Smith

http://trevor.smith.name

Member Since: April 2009

Type of Member: Resident

Trevor’s work is about helping creative individuals realize their visions.  “In general, I help people who have ideas about doing something interesting with technology.”  Sometimes that means working with an artist or with a biologist.  They all find Trevor to help them manage software development, helping find material for fabrication, etc.  “These people always have 4000 more ideas that they can’t do and that is where I fit in.”

One such project is to do the software infrastructure for a robot that will be installed in the San José Airport.  The robot will be able to react to the people, lights, the flights landing and many other factors surrounding it.  He is also building software for an installation that will be pillars covered in LEDs and his software will make the patterns in the lights.  Trevor has been a part of a diverse range of projects and his website does a great job a cataloguing them, from the robot to the websites.

Trevor is a one-man operation based in Office Nomads. Here he pours his creative energy into his projects without the distractions he found while working from home. “Raw productivity almost doubled when I came here.”  He sticks around until his daughter’s school, which is only down the street, let’s out and then they grab the bus to the door of his house.  At home he finds that he doesn’t have his own art because, he says,” All my creativity goes into helping other people solve their problems.”  He does, though, have the time to train for a half marathon he will be doing in January.  Trevor’s sister has challenged him to the Key West half marathon and, turns out, Trevor is willing to get competitive if it’s an excuse to go to Key West in January.   The Nomads will be rooting for him.

George Divoky

Website: http://www.cooperisland.org

http://blogs.discovery.com/cooper-island/

Member Since: April 2009

Type of Member: Regular

In 1975 George started going to the northern end of the Americas to study black guillemots, an arctic seabird.  The study initially began after discovering some of their nests on Cooper Island which was a rare setting for these cavity nesters.  Excited by the find, he began spending his summers studying the birds with a focus on their breeding.  As the study continued over the years it became apparent that the habits of the birds were changing and this was happening as a result of climate change.  What used to be 200 fledglings a year is dwindling to single digits as food becomes scarce and other animals move onto Cooper looking for food and impacting guillemot eggs and chicks.  The black guillemot population is hurt most by either becoming dinner for polar bears, or getting pushed aside by encroaching puffins.  George shakes his head, “The birds are trying to raise their young.  They did it in the past, the climate is changing, and now they can’t.”  Sadly, these seabirds have become a clear indicator of climate change and as it gets worse for them, “things are getting worse and worse globally”.

George’s summers are spent tallying, weighing and compiling other necessary data.  When he returns to Seattle he comes back to us at Office Nomads where he analyzes the data, does outreach regarding climate change and works to acquire funding for his research and NGO.  After being alone for 3 months, a home office with nobody else around is incredibly unappealing.  He finds calm when surrounded by other people.  “An extended period of isolation does not give you mental peace,” George said. “It makes you uncomfortable.”  At Office Nomads George has the opportunity to be part of the constantly buzzing community here and find the inner calm he misses on the island.

George can easily snag the title of “Coolest Nomad”.  His stories of island life and of his work are rather fascinating, so much so that Darcy Frey wrote a cover story in New York Times Magazine about him.  David Letterman found him just as awesome and had George on his show to talk.  And anyone who can recommend headphones and at the same talk about chasing off polar bears with a shot gun is cooler than just about everyone else in the room.

It seems to be a hot week for community input here in Seattle.  Throughout the week, we’ve seen community input being gathered at venues such as design review sessions on Capitol Hill, the open-source transition process for Mayor-Elect Mike McGinn, and even here at Office Nomads with Tuesday’s “State of the Nomads” meeting.

What each of these opportunities provides is a chance for members of a community to weigh in and help guide the direction of the community they are a part of.  As opposed to more traditional business models which try to anticipate the needs or desires of a market, community input enables a business, a nonprofit, a governmental body, or any other organization to truly map their offerings to what the community desires.

This was the second time we held a State of the Nomads gathering at Office Nomads, and it was another success for our community.  Members had a chance to hear how Office Nomads was doing as a business, what initiatives we were currently working on, and then weigh in their opinions and concerns on all aspects of Nomadic life.  This is a critical aspect to how we want Office Nomads to continue growing and thriving – with the community instead of in front of it.

Community input is more than just watching activity on a blog or a Facebook page.  It requires time.  Patience.  Solid listening skills. It is, as Tara Hunt would say, about turning the bullhorn around.  Community input is the cornerstone of building anything that is meant to serve a community need.  Whether for a building, a service, or an entire government office, community input allows for the voices of the community to be heard.  But as Steve, one of our Office Nomads members said at State of the Nomads, “you have to participate in what is made available to you.” Couldn’t have said it better myself, Steve.

So get out there in your community and start letting your voice be heard.  You might be surprised at how receptive those your speaking to are to your needs.

(Thanks to Flickr User Audin for providing this photo “Holy Feedback!” as part of the Creative Commons license.)

Susan Cope Evans

Website: http://www.officenomads.com

Member Since: The Start of Time

Type of Member: She wears the pants.

Tacked up to the wall by the phone booth, there are two large pieces of paper covered pen and pencils scribbles.  Together the smattering of sentences and half thoughts are the foundations of Office Nomads.  The headings are “Who We Are”, “What We Do”, and “What We Stand For”.  Susan and Jacob put that together over two years ago and, following our 2^nd Birthday Party, it’s still there and ringing true.

Susan spends her days at Office Nomads encouraging the space to grow into what she and Jacob had hoped it could become. Sitting there, she enjoys watching how ideas tossed out by members then get feedback from others, including diverse points of view from an urban planner, a couple of web designers, a publisher and others.  “The way we view things is very different, unique.  I don’t think I knew how powerful that could be or how rewarding.”

She set out to create a “platform on which a coworking community could grow” and can’t believe how well it has taken off, especially in the personal relationships people have grown.  “I hoped we would all get along and members would like each other.  I didn’t expect them to go to each other’s weddings and help each other move. “

“It just knocks me over sometimes,” Susan admits. “Holy crap! It’s buzzing way more than it used to.  [The atmosphere] has gotten warmer.”  From here she has her sights set on encouraging other coworking spaces in Seattle. She wants to help them get off the ground and be a support system for whomever is creating a new collaborative space, be it offices, kitchens, workshops, etc.  “I want to see more of these spaces around the city.  They are vital to urban sustainability, as far as I’m concerned.”

Robyn Welch

Website: http://www.burgis.com/

Member Since: August 2008

Type of Member: Resident

When Robyn moved to Seattle a year and a half ago, she was trying to get a handle on the whole telecommuting thing.  She had moved from New York where she had worked for four years as an urban planner with Burgis Associates.  She had thought that the move across the country would be an end to that but Burgis loved her so much that they wanted her to try telecommuting for the New Jersey-based business.  As luck would have it, she saw a sign pointing her towards Office Nomads and has not left us since.

As an urban planner, Robyn works with private firms and municipalities that are too small to have their own department for planning.  “Basically, we write master plans and development ordinances to implement the plans.”  Projects include affordable housing, open spaces, historic preservation plans, and much more.  Her projects have been known to keep her here until 11:30 PM, which is what prompted her to become a resident here at Office Nomads.

Robyn is a great, positive addition in the space.  When not working, she is usually laughing with one of the other folks sitting near her. “I was so isolated when I never left the house.  I come here and everyone is great.  I’ve made great friends.  Office Nomads has given me a good social network,” she says with a smile.  It also gives her the opportunity to live vicariously through the pet owners in the space.  With Cortez the Killer across the way and fellow nomadic pooches Chuey and Sadie taking turns sitting to her left, Robyn gets a regular quota of quality dog time. Whether it’s the people or the dogs keeping her here, Office Nomads is incredibly lucky to have Robyn on board – not only does her laughter light up the space, but her welcoming attitude has made others feel at home here on their first days as Nomads.