Constant hubbub, loud music, and people sneaking about your place all the time.
Isn’t it the worst nightmare of a Millennial leader struggling for productive and efficient work?
Nope.
It’s a short description of the atmosphere in coffee shops. And yet, many people are ready to go through it over and over again, working from cafes. More than that, they want to work from coffee shops because of notice they get their best work done there!
The Gen Y doesn’t need a 9-to-5 office workplace to stay creative and productive. They rule this world from coworking spaces and cafes, and it’s high time to join them (if you haven’t yet!)
For those still in doubt, there are at least three official reasons to give it a try.
1) Coffee Shops Stimulate Creativity
Working from the comfortable office is great, but it can knock the wind out of Millennials sales, which is the bitter enemy of creativity.
As the result, young leaders lose inspiration and motivation to work, can’t generate new ideas, and don’t feel excited about new projects. They productivity waves in farewell, either. Changing the environment, even for a day, brings stimulation that will flourish your creativity.
Of course, it’s challenging to leave the office for Starbucks every time you are in desperate need of inspiration. For such cases, specific resources and superb tools become your saviors.
“Being a kind of hipster, I consider coffee shops the best place to work! They are friendly, give endless amounts of caffeine to keep me going and encourage my concentration. When my work schedule doesn’t allow to go to cafes, I enter Coffitivity. This website brings the sounds of a cafe to my laptop, and I feel the atmosphere right in my office: people shuffling around, clinking glasses, chatter… That’s what I need for productivity boost!” confesses Nancy Christinovich from Plagiarism Check.
This phenomenon has been scientifically proven and explained.
According to research, the ambient background noise helps to focus and improve performance on creative tasks. Also, the well-known audience effect explains why having a small audience makes Millennials perform better: when you are in a coffee shop filled with people working, it makes you work harder.
2) Coffee Shops Provide Fewer Distractions
It sounds counter-intuitive, but working from coffee shops is less distracting for Millennials than working from an office.
Teammates often interrupt for work questions, coffee breaks (what an irony!), water cooler chats, etc. Sounds of coffee shops have nothing in common with the noise from colleagues, combining the benefit of anonymity with exciting activity.
Citing Conor Friedersdorf, Kevin Purdy wrote for Lifehacker:
“Coffee shops, he writes, provide “Just Enough Distraction” — more than a dead-quiet office, but not a rock concert’s worth. They also lift the mind from thinking it’s on a deadline (even if it is), and can often make work seem more fun.”
3) Coffee Shops Encourage Networking
When in coffee shops, you meet new people. Simply watching them can inspire, as well as provide you with business ideas or different perspectives on existing problems. Connecting with people who do something interesting can help with your projects, builds your network, and lets you get the most out of this environment.
A coffee shop is a perfect place for business meetings, though some experts still consider it awkward. The atmosphere is promotive of conversation on agreements, and you can support local businesses in this way.
“If you visit Big Chain Coffee, or any other national chain, of every dollar you spend, 13 cents stays in your local economy. But if you visit an independent coffee shop, 40 cents of every dollar stays. And since I run a small local business, I need to support other small local businesses. By making sure I’m known in some of the indie coffee shops in my city, I’m also earning the reputation as someone who supports local business. So when the time comes, they’ll be more interested in supporting me,” says Erik Deckers from Professional Blog Service in his article for Personal Branding Blog.
Certainly, you can’t visit a coffee shop and simply wait for your productivity to boost. To get the most out of a coffee shop environment, you should know how to work from there.
To find a coffee shop that meets your needs and encourage you to work better, try different ones rather than visiting the same cafe every time you can afford to go there. Moreover, trying different coffee shops will help to avoid a work routine that all Millennials hate so much.
