WOTSO FlexSpace is always willing to innovate and has just opened its first unmanned satellite site in Belmont, on Auckland’s North Shore.
Since acquiring the site earlier in the year the WOTSO team has breathed new life into the property, transforming it into a bright flexible workspace with eight separate offices.
What makes Belmont different to the 26 other WOTSO FlexSpaces in Australia and New Zealand is that there’s no permanent staff member onsite, nor is there any co-working space or meeting rooms.
Instead, it has been conceived as satellite office of WOTSO Takapuna, just 3km away, which has 155 desks plus meeting rooms and other facilities for Belmont members to use if required.
WOTSO CEO Jessie Glew says Belmont is a departure from WOTSO’s usual approach and presented an unaccustomed challenge. “A really important element of flex workspace is creating community, and I think the challenge with an unmanned office is how do you build that community,” says Glew.
“However, we’ve always been of the view that it is the members that build the community and WOTSO’s role is to create the spaces in which they can meet and develop those relationships organically, not to force community on our members.
“Where you’ve got larger sites you need a facilitator, a space leader, to build that community. But if you’ve got a smaller site and create a welcoming space with meeting points such as a well-stocked kitchen, we believe the community can foster itself.”
Glew says the office will be serviced by staff from Takapuna. “By having Takapuna close by we can easily manage it and provide the kitchen consumables people want; the beer in the fridge and the lollies in the jars, which will be replenished daily.
“It just won’t have a permanent staff member there, and the idea is to leverage the Takapuna location, as the sister site, for meetings and co-working space.”
She says Belmont is a test case. “We want to see if this concept works at a smaller site, and if it does, it will allow us to scatter more locations in proximity to larger sites in order to service more people locally.”
