Cowork Frederick

Because together is better.

Announcing Cotivation

Do you find your focus is often on getting urgent things done for clients or business partners while important things you or your business needs remain on the back burner?  Do you set goals and never quite reach them?  While the freedom of working for yourself can be great, the number of hats you wear and number of things on your to-do list can be daunting.  The problem is not uncommon and we’re super excited to launch Cotivation.

 

What is Cotivation™?

Part accountability group and part support team, Cotivation™ is a five-week program designed to help you go from “I have to” or “I will” to “I did.”

Gather with others, declare your goals, then track progress toward them, while examining key factors in reaching goals like how our habits impact our ability to be effective and how understanding what motivates us can help keep us focused. Keep each other accountable, tackle challenges, encourage each other and celebrate as you each cross your finish line.

Where It All Started

Sounds pretty great, huh?  We thought so, and we have to give credit where it’s due. The idea for Cotivation started in 2013 at New Work City, a coworking space in Manhattan. There, a group of members came together with the common purpose of helping one another make progress on their professional goals. As independent workers, many members of coworking spaces can face real challenges making progress on projects that lack external accountability. Cotivation arose as one way to help members motivate one another, as well as to help create a sense of accountability for one another to push projects to completion.

Cowork Frederick’s Version

That brings us to today. Cowork Frederick has put our spin on the program. Participants (AKA “Cotivators”) choose one (and only) one goal that can be achieved in five weeks. That goal might be to reach a milestone (create a website, raise $50,000 in donations), establish a habit (run every morning, write a blog every week), or improve performance (write blog posts in 2 hours).  Steps needed to reach the goal are defined and tracked.  Weekly meetings bring a sense of accountability, but also ongoing support and guidance from helpful peers. Challenges are routinely identified and tackled.  Goals are re-examined and adjusted. Participants feel a sense of growth and development, while making progress toward their goal.

Bullet Points

  • Number of participants: Minimum 4, maximum 6, including organizer (who participates)
  • Program duration: 5 weeks / 6 sessions
  • Session frequency: Weekly
  • Session duration: First session is 1.5 hours, all others are 1 hour
  • Session dates / times: determined by participants in the first session
  • Fee: Free to Cowork Frederick members (coworking or comingle), $100 to non-members
  • Ground rules – Cotivators agree to:
    • Start on time, end on time
    • Choose and work toward one goal – that is achievable in five weeks
    • Actively engage in the process and be supportive of others
    • Complete pre-work (typically 30 minutes of reading) before each session
    • Meet weekly to track progress, celebrate successes, address challenges, etc.

Interested?

A group is forming now. The first session will be held October 9 (time tbd by the group).

To sign-up, email julia@coworkfrederick.com