[Editor’s Note: Our very capable communications consultant told us we should start blogging. It will no doubt gall her, and perhaps rightfully so, that this post will rank better in search results for breakfast than for coworking. Sorry, Erin.]
[Editors’s Other Note: This nucleus for this blog was a recent email to a trusted colleague. We zhuzhed it up a little for your enjoyment and perhaps edification. Thanks for reading.]
Morning XXXX,
I'm sorry you couldn't join us for our first All-Commonplacer Breakfast on Tuesday. It was really something and you were missed! I've been reflecting on the event and I'm still struggling to fully convey my feelings on it. Relief, gratitude, excitement, motivation, obligation. You know, probably far better than I, what a simple thing it is to give people food, and what a hard thing it is to feed them.
Lauren and I spent the night before excitedly preparing. (Well I was excited, she was graciously willing, but tired. Being very pregnant will do that, I'm told.) I mistakenly made a cardinal sin and bought a bottle of low-fat milk. So I tried to think extra heavy thoughts during the mixing. We made (too much) waffle batter and filled our largest mason jar. Then we cooked down blueberries into compote, a new experience for me. Our small kitchen smelled sweetly of simmering fruit and zested lemons. We may have also added some permanent berry juice stains to our lightly finished counter.
Here's what little was communicated to people ahead of time about the morning:
Tuesday, Nov 29, from 830-1030am, we're hosting an all-Commonplacer orientation and planning breakfast at our new space in the Commongrounds building. We'll introduce and orient everyone to the new building and then facilitator extraordinaire Megan Motil will lead us in some group activities to help us (re)co-create the norms for our Commonplace culture in both spaces.
The exact nature of the aforementioned breakfast was also hinted at in our member newsletter, but as one Commonplacer later told me, "Oh, I thought you were just kidding about the waffles."
You never know if anyone will actually show up. And then of course the success of a thing is largely dependent on who shows up. It's what's in the attending heads--and their accompanying hearts--that matters more than the actual headcount.
“Movements are born of critical connections not critical mass.” - Grace Lee Boggs
Around 8:37, people started to trickle in (not that I was counting or anything). I saw the uncertainty on folk's faces. Would they be the only ones? Would this be a sad, awkward affair where they had to make small talk with four other people, while trying not to check their phones for an excuse to escape early? Internally, I echoed their concerns.
But I should have had faith. In short order, the room filled out. Almost to bursting in fact. I had to run around and grab extra chairs from across the street and wheel in an extra table. The aroma of baking waffles wafted from the room. You could smell it as soon as you stepped onto the third floor. You could also hear the sounds of conversation and frivolity. People greeting one another. Old friends and curious new colleagues.
You could tell it wasn't just breakfast folks were hungry for. Carbs only get you so far. They wanted connection. They wanted belonging. To see others and, in kind, to be seen.
In retrospect I should have brought a bell. Initially it was tough for Megan to cut through the animated conversations and laughter. Which of course is exactly the kind of problem you hope to have. But eventually, we got down to it.
Megan led the room though a series of contemplative exercises around the values they expect to see made manifest in Commonplace. She did this through a values paring exercise which built from individual contemplation, to one-on-one discussions, to table wide conversation, and finally to a room-wide dialogue.
Most Commonplacers appeared (not shockingly). aligned on a few core concepts:
Cooperative decision-making about space, uses, and design rather than topdown or directive decision-making about space, uses, and design.
Openness and tolerance for change rather than rigidity or intolerance to change.
Inclusive membership rather than selective membership, with a desired shared for mission-alignment to be considered.
Feeling of connection rather than separateness.
Welcoming rather than exclusive.
Community or systems-focused mission rather than an inwardly, organizationally, or building/space-focused mission.
And they also wrestled with seemingly opposing values. Becky ran around busing plates and I refilled coffee as our Commonplacers worked to articulate a balance between:
Informal management system with flexible/fluid roles and responsibilities and an organized management system with defined roles and responsibilities. A desire for a defined decision-making process with clear roles was shared.
Collaborative work and solitary work.
Design that nurtures individual focus and productivity and informal actions and flexibility.
Affordable and upscale member amenities, with a recognition that this is interconnected with a desire for community inclusivity.
Even allowing space for individual preference, the group sentiment was clear: Commonplacers want a space which is welcoming and which promotes collaboration while reinforcing healthy boundaries and norms around individual efforts.
Now, you and I both know that giving voice to things and effectively operationalizing them are two totally different jars of jam. So begins (again) the really hard work.
How we continue to better operate in the fullness of this expectation remains to be seen. But it will be the subject of many hours of meditation and discussion for my self and those who support Commonplace. More on that soon.
(It was also clear that not everyone who made it into the room was at the table. I could certainly use your guidance on how to incorporate even more of our members into helping shape our culture and guide the development of our organization.)
I want to go back to waffles. Because they feature prominently, perhaps the most prominently, in the success of our recent event. Great credit is due to Megan for her facilitation skills, and even more credit to everyone who showed up and shared selflessly.
But the waffles, man, the waffles. And they weren't even that good of waffles. But they were our waffles, which we made by hand for our members. And that matters.
“Cooking is like love. It should be entered into with abandon or not at all.”
– Harriet Van Horne
A bag of expertly prepared Bubbies Bagles is calorically similar to a box of mass-produced Dunkin Donuts. But everyone would agree they are very different. And I think there's as much of a chasm between those two foods as there is between a well-catered event breakfast and our homemade waffles.
A fresh meal prepared by hand is a sign of generosity, respect and love. And it’s a commitment. Not necessarily a commitment to quality of result (as we clearly demonstrated with our well-intentioned, wrong-milk waffles) but a commitment of effort and intention. It’s the old adage “show me, don’t tell me” made manifest with butter, syrup and a little blueberry compote.
And I don't say any of this to be self aggrandizing. But it is crazy to me how easy it is for anyone to do this. It costs less and takes roughly the same amount of time as ordering a spread and laying it all out.
It's a really big, small thing. I hope If we continue to cook for our members then others will in time follow suit.
Because after all, what’s a day without waffles?
Thanks for reading through this whole damn thing. See you soon!
-n
