When you’re busy juggling, different places can help reflect the multi-dimensional you. You’ll have your office, perhaps a workspace at home, favourite coffee shops where you do certain things and weekend places where you do others, a summerhouse at the end of the garden or a park bench.
When the coffee shop trend started up in the early ‘90s they were trying to create what was billed a ‘Third Place’ between work and home, a space that mixed social with work. Well forget Third Place, in 2009 it’s more like thirty three places. We are nomadic, working from airplanes, trains, wherever. There are no rules and no walls to where and how we work.
In the week I met him in Paris CEO Worldwide of Saatchi & Saatchi, Kevin Roberts’ schedule was taking in Mexico, Miami, Peru and Brussels. With his offices in New York and New Zealand and homes in New York, New Zealand, St. Tropez and Grasmere in the UK, this guy travels a heck of a lot. All contribute – in different ways – to making him an effective Juggler.
‘All of them connect past, present and future. All of them have work, play, friendship and family relevance. All of them are perfectly set up for me to be effective and efficient in terms of work. The different bases help me juggle because all of them are themed differently and are typical of their regions. They all have meaning and all serve to inspire me. New York is an abstract art driven Tribeca loft, Grasmere is a typical Lakeland cottage in National Park land. St. Tropez is a Provence villa, and New Zealand is an environmentally friendly sports complex’.
But you don’t need to have four homes around the world to be a good Juggler. You can create your own diversity through different spaces that energise and stimulate you, whether hotel rooms, cafes, workspaces or open spaces. These can reflect different sides of your personality. I have a mix of ‘zones’ - client offices, member clubs, coffee shops, workspaces - that I have available; each of which has played its own contribution as a space to juggle. Spaces for meeting, for thinking, for writing, for problem solving, each with their own source of inspiration.
So forget just one room with four walls, make your office a variety of environments that will help you get results in whatever you do, however you want to work...
When the coffee shop trend started up in the early ‘90s they were trying to create what was billed a ‘Third Place’ between work and home, a space that mixed social with work. Well forget Third Place, in 2009 it’s more like thirty three places. We are nomadic, working from airplanes, trains, wherever. There are no rules and no walls to where and how we work.
In the week I met him in Paris CEO Worldwide of Saatchi & Saatchi, Kevin Roberts’ schedule was taking in Mexico, Miami, Peru and Brussels. With his offices in New York and New Zealand and homes in New York, New Zealand, St. Tropez and Grasmere in the UK, this guy travels a heck of a lot. All contribute – in different ways – to making him an effective Juggler.
‘All of them connect past, present and future. All of them have work, play, friendship and family relevance. All of them are perfectly set up for me to be effective and efficient in terms of work. The different bases help me juggle because all of them are themed differently and are typical of their regions. They all have meaning and all serve to inspire me. New York is an abstract art driven Tribeca loft, Grasmere is a typical Lakeland cottage in National Park land. St. Tropez is a Provence villa, and New Zealand is an environmentally friendly sports complex’.
But you don’t need to have four homes around the world to be a good Juggler. You can create your own diversity through different spaces that energise and stimulate you, whether hotel rooms, cafes, workspaces or open spaces. These can reflect different sides of your personality. I have a mix of ‘zones’ - client offices, member clubs, coffee shops, workspaces - that I have available; each of which has played its own contribution as a space to juggle. Spaces for meeting, for thinking, for writing, for problem solving, each with their own source of inspiration.
So forget just one room with four walls, make your office a variety of environments that will help you get results in whatever you do, however you want to work...
[An excerpt from my book ‘Juggle! Rethink Work, Reclaim Your Life’]
1 comment:
Absolutely. There's something about getting out of the office and having the blue sky above that frees your mind. No ceiling. Limitless creative possibilities emerge.
Failing this, regular changes of scene help keep the creative juices flowing.
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