A Home Away From Home, Co-working Spaces Are Like Joint Families Working Together Under One Roof- Says Preeti Yadav, Founder & CEO of WorkWize Co-working
Work is worship and your workplace is like an extended home where we spend almsot 1/3 of our entire professional life. In today’s fast paced world, setting an office could be one of the most difficult task which almost all the startups juggle while setting their business and making it to launchpad. In metro cities the throat cutting prices of rent, internet, electricity and furnishing consumes your entire budget of your startup and this becomes and bone stuck in the neck when you are bootstrapped.
Co-working spaces have come a long way since the Startup India drive started in India. There are so many co-working spaces in India where small teams work together like Joint Families.
The success of a new startup idea is largely dependent on how well the end product or service sells. This cuts across all kinds of startups even for a non-profit, you still have to sell your product or idea to benefactors, investors, volunteers, etc. New startup ideas for the most part usually have very little validation and many assumptions are inherent in them. Testing out your new startup idea is critical to its successful execution. If you have read Lean Startup by Eric Ries, you should know that you need to have business-hypothesis-driven experimentations, iterative product releases, and validated learning. Your startup should be analyzed objectively to prevent great loss of resources. However, this can become costly in the real world especially with user testing. A coworking space can make this easily achievable. Coworking allows for innovative collaboration with individuals who bring new and critical feedbacks to projects that you may have either overlooked or never considered. Various ways exist to test your ideas in a coworking space.
Attend Events
Coworking spaces thrive off networking. Networking events at coworking spaces are often centered around showcasing innovative talents and new startup opportunities. The audience is usually fully packed with investors, startup founders, potential users, as well as sponsors in the market for a new idea that could benefit their bottom line. This is a great opportunity to get you startup idea in front of other people. You could pitch your start up idea or do a live demo to make everyone at the event to at least be aware of your product.
Get your coworking mates to test out your idea(s)
Whether your startup idea is a product or service, testing out your start up idea by running it through your coworking mates is a great way to start. This is because creativity flows in coworking spaces, unlike most other conventional leased office spaces. Organize your coworking mates together and make a presentation of your new startup idea where you could then receive immediate feedback as part of a group discussion. This allows for constructive criticism which drives critical thinking to enable you to decide if the idea is viable. A survey is another effective tool that can be used to gather information about your startup idea. The information gotten from carrying out a survey in your coworking space can then be analyzed to draw inferences. With their feedbacks, you could come up with alternative versions of the same product before you launch the most successful version of your product.
Recruit talents
For new startup ideas, technical hires who can visualize the idea and turn it into a business venture are usually in high demand. Recruitment remains one of the biggest bottlenecks that is holding startups back from achieving their business goals. A coworking space is the perfect place to find talented, goal-oriented, and hardworking individuals. These are definitely the kind of people you will need to test out your new startup idea. The best way to attract talents for your new startup idea is to discuss your vision, goals and driving force. Inform your coworking about the type and level of competencies that are needed, while simultaneously giving an outline of your project objectives.
The coworking space provides the right kind of environment to test out your new ideas. Leverage on the richness of a coworking space and succeed in the transforming your new startup idea into a profitable business venture.
Today we are presenting an exclusive interview of a very charming, bubbly and go-getter entrepreneur Miss. Preeti Yadav Srikrishnan. Preeti Happens to be a very successful entrepreneur who started her venture Aspire HR Services and now also owns a startup co-working space in the Capital of the country India – New Delhi. Her startup co-working space WorkWize is located in one of the most posh locality of Delhi that is Dwarka and currently holds more than 75+ startups in her bag.
Lets See what Preeti has to share about her entire journey with our readers and see where she plans to take her venture ahead.
1.What is the Name of Your Venture? Any specific reason for this name?
WorkWize Co-Working
2.Who is your target Audience/clients?
Start- Ups and Small & medium Size Industries
3.Where is your venture based (city, state, country) & What are your geographical target areas?
Currently our co-working is in delhi- Dwarka only but we will be opening new center in Chandigarh and Bangalore soon
4.What problems does your venture resolve? What are your products or services?
We run a Co-Working or incubation center where in we provide space solutions, HR Services, Accounting Services and Marketing solutions under one roof to start ups and small and medium enterprise for
5.Share the idea or story behind the venture. How did it came to an existence? What motivated you to start your own venture?
I am successfully running an HR firm named Aspire HR Solutions Pvt. Ltd. From the past 10 years. We do leadership hiring for MNC clients but as we are small company with the team of 15-20 employees, we always faced a problem in office space and as we were working from our own office and I was handling everything single handedly, so use to spent most of my time in non- productive work of managing the office and due to which my main work was getting hampered. So the idea came into my mind that most of the start up and small firms owners cannot focus on their work because of office management and if they need any professional services they have to look some external vendor. Now we are offering all time solutions under one roof like HR Services, Accounting services, Marketing and IT Services
6. Who are your biggest competitors and how do you differentiate yourself from them?
I feel that you should not run an incubator or a co-working place to make huge profits, We want to work as a facilitator for our members so as they can focus on their primary work and help our economy to grow.
7. How did you identify your co-founder? Tell us something about your co-founder/s
As if now I am the only one who is running this entire show but yes I do have huge support and guidance of my husband at every step of by business. He is my core strength and always push me to work smartly.
8.How did you hired your first team members? What skills Do you want in your employees/team?
I have identified one of my team member from my HR firm to work as a community manager as she posses great people management skills and she is very supportive and can gel easily with all age group of people. As we have members of different age groups so we have to understand them and give them best environment to work
- What expansion plans are you looking for the next 2 years, next 5 years?
We are planning to open 2 more center with in 2 year one in Delhi/NCR and one in Chandigarh, but my main idea is to do something for working women. So we might come up with an incubation which is only for working women so we can built a st
10.Where do you want to see yourself in next 10 years?
I am an aspiring entrepreneur. I am currently in learning stage. Entrepreneurship doesn’t have an end destination because the world is constantly changing. In 10 years, I predict that my company will have spun off at least twenty successful Centers across India with special and unique offerings like Day care, Gym, meditation center alongside most comfortable co-working.
11.What are your goals over the next 1, 3, 6 and 12 months?
In a month we will coming up with 1 more center in west delhi and within next 6 month we will opening one new center in South Delhi and if all goes well we might open one center in Chandigarh as well
12.Have you raised any funding? Or have any plans for the funding?
As if now we have not raised any funding. For the next center as well we don’t have any plans for raising the funds but for our south delhi center we will surely look for some funding
13.What were the problems you faced during the starting days and how did you resolve them?
As I was already handling my HR firm and my team is very much close to me so when I was setting up workwize I was not able to give much of my time to Aspire India but then I delegated all my HR firm’s work in my team and I am lucky to have such a strong and supportive team that they took care of my HR work completely and I started devoting more time in workwize
14.What was the most challenging part of your journey till now? How did you overcome those challenges?
As every-set of business has its own challenges we also faced lots of problem initially. The main purpose of Workwize is to create nice environment for startups and small firm and that is too with minimum costing, our target was to make budgeted co-working place but on the other hand not compromising on quality of services. Making beautiful things at nominal rates are always challenging for us but still we tried our best to give best working place to our members.
15.Are you married, single or in a relationship?
I am married and I have one 5 year old son
16.What are your hobbies? What do you do in your non-work time?
My hobby is traveling but my current work does not allow me to do that as if now. I always love to spend quality time with my family. So I always make sure that I spend all my non work time with my Son Swastik and my family. I always make sure that I will not loose any quality time to be with family
17.Whats your favorite food & holiday destination?
I love Chinese food and I love to spend cozy time near the sea so any good location with private beach is good enough to recharge me
18.Whom do you consider your idol or biggest motivator?
I admire every successful self-made person. So from Late Shree Abdul Kalam jee to Jack Maa founder of Alibaba, I admire all. I believe that to be a successful entrepreneur you need to be from the same family background. You can reach to any level with your smart work
19.What do you feel is the major difference between entrepreneurs and those who work for someone else?
The major difference between both is mindset. Entrepreneur has to work 24/7. “Entrepreneurs thrive on risk, while employees try to avoid it. They are attracted to stability, which can often be a hindrance to innovation in the workplace. For an entrepreneur it’s a passion for business that drives them to start and scale a business and makes sure their brain never stops running. When you are your own boss, every single decision comes down to you so all stake will also be yours.
20.If you had the chance to start your career over again, what would you do differently?
I feel I am on a right track till now so I would not like to change anything from my past. Slowly and steadily I am moving towards my Goals
21.How has being an entrepreneur affected your family & Social life?
If I will compare my life with my other corporate employee’s friends I feel slightly better in terms of work-Life balance. Being an entrepreneur if you work smartly you can balance your work and family life better. I can stretch my working hours as per requirement and on the other side I can stretch my family time with proper delegation of work. I need not to sit in office for long just to impress my bosses and I give the same liberty to my employees as well.
22. Anything, you would like to say to our readers or upcoming entrepreneurs?
Believe in yourself, be consistence and always open to take risk. Entrepreneurs have three main boosters to start their work at any time: Love, Patience, and Dedication
23.Tell us something about your education & family background.
I have done my MBA from Amity Business School and hails from a middle class family. In my family I am the only one who has started something of her own. I had full support of my Mother and my elder Sister when I started my 1st business. Apart from them every member and relative of my family discouraged me to do the business of my own.
24. What is your USP which makes it unique & different from other start-ups in similar domains
we are trying to make a service based incubation. These days most of the co-working is helping their members in getting investments and funds. We want to give our members solutions and service of all their basic business needs. And also in future we want to start some of our incubation for working mothers and female entrepreneurs. As a female entrepreneur I understand the challenges which one can face in their journey of business so I want them to focus on their gaol leaving all operational task on our shoulder
- Do you consider yourself successful and by what means do you measure success?
I tend to view success incrementally. As someone who is invigorated by new, complex challenges, I never want to find myself in a situation where I feel like there is nothing left to learn or achieve. I evaluate success based on not only my work, but on my learning as well. I am still in a learning face and yet to achieve so many things. But yes I can say that I am on a right track. If, I can leave work each evening satisfied that I’ve learned something new or useful, then this counts as success to me
26.Please share complete name, address, phone number, email id & website of Your Business & Contact Person
Preeti Yadav Srikrishnan
D 485, Sector 7, Dwarka, New Delhi, India
[email protected]
http://www.workwize.in
