Unwelcome at a coworking space

Hello, and welcome to the traveling introvert. Today I'm going to talk about co working spaces. And the reason I want to talk about co working spaces is because recently I did a lot of traveling. I think it was a ridiculous amount of countries in a short amount of time. And I love to explore the different co working spaces that might be available and most co working spaces have a free offer or a free day or an hour, or they'll show you around. And so there was one co working space that I went to in Wellington and New Zealand. And they knew I was coming they were having an open week where they were giving out free co working spaces and open hot desking for the week. And you have to sign up to go to the New York Comic and you had to say which days that you're going to come in. So they have this information on me already. I entered the coworking space known as that reception. I look around and Okay, but there is an iPad there for you to sign in. So I go ahead and I sign in this place that very blatantly says hot desk so I go and sit myself down and I see the Wi Fi code and use that and start working. I don't put my headphones in. I didn't do all the usual things that I do when I just want to sit down and work just because I wanted to be open to someone to come up to me and welcome you to the CO working space and show me where everything was. And this was about 10am. at one o'clock I get hungry. I see the someone at reception she sees me but doesn't say anything. I kind of look around I see people taking water so I scrambled around and I kind of find a cup eventually and so on and so forth. I then go out have get lunch come back in. People are cooking because in this particular co working space there is a full on stove and people are cooking I sit in and kind of eat lunch with a toothpick because I can't find the knives forks. Spit any cutlery, and I haven't been shown round. And I quite frankly too nervous to go and say anything. So yes, I know part of this is my own fault. But move on to another couple of hours of the day. It's now 445 and the receptionist finally comes up to me and he said, Oh, hey, such and such and I'm like, Yes, I am. Oh, I I saw he checked in but I just I wasn't I welcome to the coworking space and I hope you found everything Okay, and what was it? At no point did I get told where the bathrooms were, what the facilities were the coworking spaces was their quiet rooms was their Skype rooms where the cutlery was where to find water, tea, coffee. Welcome to the coworking space. This is all the activities we have going on. Nothing, nothing at all. And come in being there for an entire day. being ignored by reception felt uncomfortable enough that I Couldn't be didn't want to ask where the cutlery was. And that was it. And this was the open house week like they wouldn't new people were coming in. They were expecting people to come in there was events going on. And basically they ignored me. And glutton for punishment, I went back for a second day. And I got ignored gang and it's not like this co working space was super busy and couldn't have seen me. I was the only non white person there I kind of stick out and still reception or any of the other members because they were also doing like an Instagram. Like photoshoot thing. No one said anything to me. In fact, I might be in some of their photos because they failed to mention that they were taking photos and I don't really think I send an undisclosed anyway. So co working spaces. When you are having an open event. Try and be welcoming especially as you You have my information in advance I then checked in on the iPad and somehow reception so don't notice this did not come and find me did not make me welcome did not show me where everything was. And this was your chance for me to be like, Oh, I'm gonna go tell everybody because it happened that there was 100 plus bunch of people in Wellington, specifically digital nomads who are looking for co working spaces and I can recommended your place, but I didn't. Because, yeah, not great. So that is just one of my experiences with coworking spaces around the world. I'm sure there will be more to come because I'm now thinking of others. But that one particularly stuck out just because I was not made to feel I wasn't not made to feel welcome, but I wasn't made to feel welcome. I'd love to know if you have any co working space stories or what would make a really good coworking space for you. Oh, and did I mention they were singing they had a radio on and people were singing along to the radio anyway Thank you for listening. This is Janice from the career introvert helping you launch your podcast using systems and workflows to prevent overwhelm.