The work culture in India has been evolving drastically. The main reason for this has been the introduction of Western categorization in the 1990s. The change has been primarily driven by businesses and real estate shifts. The growing need of workplace that is fit for a mature and global Indian workforce had led to more flexible offices.
Over the past few decades, office culture has evolved significantly; it has been adopting new and casual ways of working. Moreover, in the past 5 years, the metro cities are embracing independent style of working.
This has led to the emergence of remote working culture in the country. While some companies established to offer ‘work from home’ jobs to people, a lot of firms also initiated to provide remote work to their existing employees.
Some of the firms that offer work-from-home jobs to people in India include – CACTUS, Connecting All India (CAI) and Working Solutions, among others. Also, some big companies that are providing work-from-home opportunities to their employees are –Teletech, Amazon, Axelerant and Convergys Corporation.
Owing to this, co-working culture and virtual offices made its way into India. These spaces are shared workplace that offer an independent style of working. Unlike traditional offices, co-working is like a social gathering of a group of people, who work without any supervision. These people are usually like-minded people who share same value.
Most of the times, co-working spaces are used as an option by work from home workers. It is a solution that allow them to deal with the problem of isolation they feel while working from home. Besides, these freelancers can also escape the distractions that they face at home.
Co-working spaces also provide an opportunity to work with people with completely different skill-set. This allows a person to discover new source of ideas. Joyce Anderson, an online-marketing consultant says, “When a person takes the risk of inviting others to work alongside, it breathes a new life into the creation process. Besides, it also enhances the finished product.”
Work-from-home workers also get an opportunity to network and collaborate with a wide range of bright minds through co-working. It allows them to meet people, make friends and to collaborate with professionals from their fields.
Although shared spaces are mostly chosen by freelancers, millennial entrepreneurs and startups, corporate organizations in India are also embracing this modern way of working. These corporates are willing to cut down the rising expenses and invest in co-working spaces. These firms have started to rent or own exclusive spaces, and hence, are disrupting the traditional norms of doing business. Encouraging all these efforts, co-working spaces have also started to follow a pay-as-you-use model by defining rates for their offered services.
As companies like Working Solutions, Connecting All India (CAI) and CACTUS are providing work-from-home job opportunities in India, the need for co-working spaces is growing. Moreover, these companies are allowing several people to work at their own pace and choose a flexible lifestyle.
Statistics show that in 2017, co-working spaces absorbed nearly 1.5 million sqft of area across India. It is anticipated that the segment will touch 10 million sqft by 2020.
