Do you work from home, or live at work?

I remember this meme doing the rounds, early in the Covid lockdowns, when so many people were struggling to adapt to forced home working for the first time - blundering through it with no sense of boundaries or expectations, and dealing with so many other stresses the global emergency presented (email readers may have to 'load images' or something to see it):

Like all good humour, this cartoon was grounded in an existential reality for many, as everyday routines and boundaries were abandoned and people did their best to make sense of it all, frequently without managers who had any idea how to lead and support distributed teams. For many people, before that point, work had always been a place they went, to do the thing they did - and inevitably, upending this overnight was a massive shift.

As someone who had been working from home for over two decades at that point, I did my best to support and help those around me, while also debunking some of the terrible advice on offer from various quarters. I remember writing this back in March 2020:

Which seems like a lifetime ago. Tiger King, ¡Resisteré! and banana bread... Oh my. Not that we're ready to get nostalgic about the Covid era just yet...

You can't beat a bit of nostalgia though, and I am loving the current UK TV reboot of Changing Rooms: a series from the turn of the millennium where neighbours redecorate rooms in each other's homes on camera, under the creative direction of some flamboyant design professionals. Will each household love or hate what each other has done, in the big reveal? It's my Wednesday evening guilty pleasure, and channels reflection on all those gloriously retro decor trends of stencilling and scumble glaze, which include memories of my very first home office.

So, it was fun to see last week's episode tackling the design challenge of creating a live/work space for a work-from-home photographer, needing a dual purpose living room and office. THAT certainly never came up in those early series, because no one except me worked from home! I loved what they did in the episode with colour to create different areas for the differently-purposed parts of the room, though I disagreed with the need to physically section it off and reduce the overall feeling of space.

What do I know, I am not an interior designer, and I have always been lucky enough to plan around having a properly separate office in my home. At least a moveable curtain screen gave optionality for the young couple in the programme, but there are many different ways to create boundaries of different natures between life and work - I have written a whole book about it so won't go on, suffice to say you need to consider a whole load of factors both within your own mind and how you relate to your work, other people, and your physical environment.

Life and work unlocked

At least most people now have a choice about where to do their thing, it is no longer the binary home-or-office question. During the lockdown chaos of 2020 few people realised what an important transition was taking place, as they severed the link between work-as-a-place and work-as-a-process. Since that time, many have grasped the potential opportunities the process opened up - and if their manager hasn't, then they're voting with their feet in every sense.

You no longer have to live at work, OR work at home. Work goes along with you where you want to be - whether that's in a buzzing shared space, a cosy local coffee shop, your own back bedroom, or a different country every few months.

And if you love to travel and mix it up, it gets easier all the time, to find accommodation and workspace ready adapted to your needs wherever you go - connectivity, a decent workspace, and an existing community, make all the difference.

The rise of Coliving

Not surprisingly, many enterprising travel and hospitality businesses are keen to adapt and serve those who want to take their work with them, but the details matter. Even if you are occupying it temporarily, when you live and work in the same place, that place has to be right for both - flexible, comfortable, and adaptable.

No one wants a return to the lockdown nightmares, of badly-planned space, too many interruptions, and feeling trapped.

Today's Future is Freelance podcast guest Leah Ziliak is an expert in coliving spaces, with a background in the hospitality industry - so her role as a Coliving Consultant came naturally to her, bridging the gap between an industry focused on tourism and leisure, with the needs of a new kind of traveller:

When you find the perfect place to live and work - whether that's at home or when you're travelling - it's a win-win. The friction goes away, and life flows. So Leah helps her clients, the hospitality providers, to understand what location-independent workers really need, and build high-quality experiences around those needs.

Another win-win happens when you find the right gap in the market to offer unique business services where they're needed, and to build a lifestyle around doing just that - so every freelancer will be inspired by Leah's journey, to finding the work she was meant to do.

Have you ever stayed in a coliving? It might be worth considering, the next time you're planning a trip where you will also be working, whatever the duration. It certainly beats trying to pin down how fast the wifi really is going to be in that Airbnb, or peering through tiny photos of hotel rooms trying to judge the potential ergonomics of seating chosen for appearance rather than laptop working for hours at a time...

When you step outside the comfort of your WFH bubble, exciting things happen - and next week I'll be in a new country, sharing an update from a new digital nomad gathering,

Until then!

Maya Middlemiss