Working in a coworking space provides a unique experience and the flexibility to act and carry yourself differently than in a traditional office space. However, the opportunity to have a space to work in such a flourishing environment comes with a great responsibility to maintain harmony.

While important in traditional office spaces as well, etiquette rules play an even more significant role in shared spaces. West Quay Offices give you the option to leave your desk at any time to network, take advantage of extra services, and connect with a unique social environment that you wouldn’t find anywhere else. However, this also comes with challenges in terms of your overall privacy, working without distractions, and working with strangers.

It’s for this reason that you need to practice proper etiquette. And even more so, post pandemic, it’s essential to follow some rules for a productive, friendly, safe, and healthy workspace. So, check out the etiquette rules below and please follow them so we can all work happily together.

Respect boundaries

Both on a physical and emotional level, you should be mindful of other people’s space. For example, make sure that you’re allowing enough room for other people in communal spaces, especially when you have a bunch of items with you. While hot desks are assumed to be shared, dedicated desks and private offices are off limits, so don’t peruse a book, borrow a pen, or go through documents you find on one. If you see someone wearing headphones or immersed in their work, don’t distract them for no reason.

Be Mindful of Noise Management

The first thing you must be mindful of is your volume. In an open office, sound carries a lot easier, and some parts of our office can carry sound through other sections of the workspace, as well.

It’s important to know the noise policy not just for what you can and can’t do, but also to have an understanding of it. Essentially, you should know where you can have Zoom meetings and where you can sing aloud.

Be Considerate of the Shared Areas

For instance, be aware if the kitchen area is also a place for people on laptops to continue working, in which case make sure you aren’t talking too loudly. So, just be aware of where you are in the office and adjust your behavior to correspond to that area and if there are others working around you.

Meetings

You may have small meetings in the lounge area as long as they are under 30 minutes and the noise level is limited. This kind of quick meeting is generally with 2 people.

For all meetings longer than 30 minutes, privacy is needed, there will be discussions, or there will be more than two attendants. This should be done in our meeting rooms.

We have two meeting rooms that you can book through our members portal, information tablets attached to the meeting rooms, our mobile application and reception in person.

Informal meetings are part of coworking. If you’re hosting a formal meeting or need a screen to share private information, then the lounge area or your desk might not be the right location. You can book one of our two meeting rooms for full privacy and to look professional.

Small Meeting Room

If you want, make a Zoom or any online meeting and you don’t have a Private Office (or don’t want to do your meeting there somehow), book a small meeting room for an extended or group call. This room can accommodate 4 people, has a 40-inch HD TV if you want to broadcast your meeting, and it is soundproof as well.

These meeting rooms are a lot cheaper than our Large Meeting Room, and you have a lot of FREE booking credit dollars in your account already. These credits will expire at the end of each month. So please use them. You can also book them easily by tapping your mobile phone on tablet on the entrance of the booking room. You can make last minute bookings as well.

Large Meeting Room

This meeting room can accommodate 8 people and packed with everything you may need:

• 4K 50″ TV that you can easily broadcast,
• Cisco Conference Call Phone,.
• Wireless charger for 2 mobile phones at same time,
• Catering option.

If you plan to do to any informal or business meeting with more than 4 people, this should be the spot to make it happen.

Zoom Meetings

Try not to do Zoom meetings in common areas like the lounge area. If you have to, try to lower your voice and your device’s speaker volume. Everyone understands that some level of noise is acceptable in the lounge area, but be reasonable about the amount of noise you create.

If you have a private office, please do your meetings there. If you can’t, or if you are a coworking member, please book small meeting room for these meetings. Small meeting room can be booked for as little as 30 minutes. All members have included meeting room cash credits in their accounts that will expire each month. There is no reason you should not do your meetings in a comfortable meeting room in privacy. Our meeting rooms is equipped with a 4K TV and camera, so you can connect your laptop and technically have a high-quality meeting.

Single Private Work Booths

These are single work pods for a single person. We also provide a monitor in there so one can connect their laptop and work in harmony and not get distracted by surroundings or sounds.

Lounge Area Work Booths

These will provide you with some minor privacy for your client meetings if you won’t be talking about top secret deals. We have six of them and can accommodate up to four people.

Dining

Small snacks and coffee can be consumed on all areas as long as you keep the location clean afterwards. Dining and food should be consumed in our small dining area near the kitchen. We have plans to enlarge the dining area and make it more private soon.

Clean Up After Yourself

As with parties, social events, and, of course, coworking spaces, the best practice is to “leave no trace.” For the sake of the staff and the well-being of other members you work with, leave the workspace as if nobody used it. If you don’t want empty bags of chips and granola bar wrappers left on your desk at the time you book it, make sure you don’t leave any waste for the person booking that desk after you. Also, don’t assume that someone will clean the working spot after you.

While this goes without saying in a coworking space, it’s now important to pay even more attention to the shared areas. Make sure to properly dispose of garbage, as well as used paper towels in bathrooms and kitchens, sterilize the tables where you eat, and try to always have your hands washed or sanitized before and after touching things such as doorknobs and light switches. Also, don’t leave open drinks or food in the fridge in a shared kitchen, and don’t leave used dishes and silverware in the sink or countertops, but rather wash them immediately before putting them away.

Don’t Overuse Services or Amenities

It can create extra problems and distractions for the members of a workspace when someone oversteps their boundaries. This includes overbooking conference rooms and locking others out, using all the paper in the copy machine, and using a space that is assigned to someone else.

Remember to practice etiquette rules and only use your allocated space, use the meeting rooms for the time you actually need it and stay within the space you rented. If your space is inadequate, you can always find a quiet work area or a phone booth to work without distractions.

Information and Booking Tablets

All our meeting rooms and single work booths have information tablets attached. If these tablets display text in red, it means there is someone inside or a meeting in progress. Do not try to enter the room or disturb others. You can still use the same tablet for booking and learn when the room is next available.

Know How and Where to Handle Delicate Work Situations

Some business needs to be handled behind closed doors. It’s not a good practice to terminate a partnership or an employee’s contract within a communal space, nor is it proper to handle a difficult conversation or business negotiation in shared areas, like the kitchen. Be mindful of the energy you put out within the workspace to avoid awkward situations and to not be a distraction.

Stay Home if Unwell

Another commonsense rule that should go without saying is to stay home if you feel unwell. Regardless of whether you have COVID or not, avoiding the risk of giving whatever you have to your coworkers should be eliminated by you choosing to work from home. Also, if you happen to have some symptoms while at work, go home immediately. Another important thing to keep in mind is to let your employer know that you are feeling unwell so that they may monitor any interactions between you and your coworkers.

Use Common Sense

As a general rule, treat the space like you want it to be treated. This means eating only in designated areas, brushing up on the visitor policy, and smoking outside. And while this should go without saying, avoid discriminatory behavior and harassment toward your fellow freelancers—it’s their space, too.

Be friendly

One of the most important aspects of coworking is being social and networking with people. Interact with like-minded people and build connections. Be friendly and greet people with a smile, it’ll help you make connections that will help you later in your career. One of the main reasons people prefer to work in a coworking space is to make connections and build their network.

Say Hello

It’s amazing what that one simple word can do. Hello.

If you are working in a shared office space, coworking etiquette is to greet people as you see them. You don’t have to go around the office and ask everyone how their weekend was, but you should show people the respect of recognizing that they are a colleague when you see them as such.

It’s a good idea to start this practice right away when you start using a shared office. It’s much easier to say hello on day one than to awkwardly do it after a month. People who work in coworking spaces are there because they appreciate the value of social and professional interaction, so don’t be afraid to network!

Do engage with the coworking community

Talk to people! Coworking spaces are about community and collaboration. Reach out to your coworkers to bounce off ideas, to discuss hobbies, to help them solve a problem, etc. Interaction and engagement is a core part of any coworking space and it’s essential to nurture a strong community. This doesn’t mean you have to spend most of your time talking to others, but make sure you don’t isolate yourself; if you do, you won’t be getting all the value a coworking space has to offer. People will want to get to know you; they will be interested in what you do.

No Dangerous Activities or Items

For the safety and enjoyment of all members of our community, all members, guests, and others using our spaces shall act in a respectful manner in the space, use the space in a manner consistent with typical commercial office building usage, and shall not perform any activity or cause or permit anything that is reasonably likely to be disruptive or dangerous to us or any members, or our/their employees, guests, or property. The use of West Quay Offices to conduct or pursue any illegal or offensive activities is strictly prohibited.

Weapons of any kind, and any other offensive, dangerous, hazardous, inflammable, or explosive materials are strictly prohibited in West Quay Offices. If you become aware of a weapon in the West Quay Offices, notify reception.

Guests

• Limited number of guests are permitted according to your membership plan. Meeting rooms should booked and used for guests more than 2.
• You must register all guests through our mobile app or members portal.  Guests are required to check-in at the front desk or using our kiosk, and we will notify you of their arrival. Guests will not be allowed on your floor until you have been properly notified.
• Guests must be accompanied by yourself and one of your staff at all times (particularly any guests that are under the age of majority) and are not permitted to use the common spaces without being absent.
• You are responsible for your guests while they are in West Quay Offices.

Help the staff

If you see that something needs to be fixed or improved let the staff know, sometimes they don’t even notice.

Do read your community manager’s emails

Emails and communication efforts from your community manager are important. They’re typically full of useful and relevant information, upcoming events, and important notices (like changes of schedule, holiday hours, closures, updated wi-fi passwords, etc.). This will prevent you from asking unnecessary questions to your community manager, and it will help make sure that your coworking experience is as seamless as possible.

Recycle Station

Please recycle your garbage in the right spots in this location.

Mails and Packages

If your membership allows, we collect your mail and package receipts. We will notify you by email, you will see the notification on our members portal and on our mobile app. For members who have mail and package services as part of their membership, mail and packages can be picked up at the reception desk.

Packages must be collected within 30 days of receipt, and letters within 60 days of receipt. After such period, we reserve the right to return the items to the sender at your expense, charge a storage fee or dispose of the items. If you are expecting exceptionally large or valuable deliveries, please inform the reception so that we may arrange appropriate receipt and storage. Coordinate with us if you want this package or mail to be forwarded.

Don’t give your sales pitch to fellow members

There’s a fine line between asking for feedback and selling your product or service to members. We have a private discussion board, channel, or group that allows members to easily get in touch with one another; these groups should be used to ask for feedback, recommendations, and the like; not to try and get more clients. Those who are interested in what you do will reach out to you themselves. If you constantly try to sell to them, you’ll become a sort of outcast, and they will be less likely to give you the time of day.

No Posters or Signs

To keep things fair and consistent for all members, please don’t put up signs or posters on interior and exterior windows or walls.

Couriers & Delivery

For the safety of all members, delivery personnel and couriers are not permitted beyond the front desk in West Quay Offices.

Access Cards and Fobs

Your West Quay Offices membership, member key card, and fobs are non-transferable and are intended for the use of the person to whom they are allocated in your membership agreement, only; they are not intended to provide access or use to other parties. If you lose or damage your key card, please notify the reception as soon as possible. You may be charged a fee for a replacement key card. Replacement fees are displayed on members portal and mobile app.

You are not permitted to make copies of any keys, key cards, or other means of entry to any West Quay Offices space, or lend, share, or transfer any keys or key cards to any third party, unless authorized by us in advance.

Do not allow others to access key card restricted areas without swiping their own key cards. If someone follows you into West Quay Offices without swiping their key card, please request that they check in with reception or notify reception.

High Consumption Items

Persons using our space may not, without our prior approval, operate any equipment in our space that has a higher heat output or electrical consumption than in a typical office environment, or places excessive strain on our electrical, IT, HVAC, or structural systems.

Network Security

For any persons using the West Quay Offices wireless internet, such persons’ computers, tablets, mobile devices and other electronic equipment must be:

• kept up-to-date with the latest software updates provided by the software vendor and
• kept clean of any malware, viruses, spyware, worms, Trojans, or anything that is designed to perform malicious, hostile and/or intrusive operations. 

Stolen Items

While you are using a West Quay Offices, you are responsible for your personal property. West Quay Offices will not be responsible for any lost or stolen items.

We provide lockers for members and private offices can be locked by their owners.

Discrimination and Harassment

Discrimination and harassment will not be tolerated. Specifically, West Quay Offices prohibits discrimination and/or harassment against any individual on our premises, including West Quay Offices personnel, members, vendors, and guests, because of that individual’s gender, sexual orientation, marital or civil status, pregnancy (or pregnancy-related conditions), gender identity or expression, transgender status or gender reassignment, race, color, national origin or ancestry, citizenship, religion or religious beliefs, age, physical or mental disability, genetic information (including genetic testing and characteristics), military or veteran status, or any other grounds or characteristics protected under the law. West Quay Offices takes any violations of this discrimination and harassment policy seriously and encourages reporting any violations. To report a violation, contact the community team. If any member, vendor, or guest is found to have violated this discrimination and harassment policy, West Quay Offices will take appropriate remedial action to address the conduct, up to, and including, prohibiting the member, vendor, or guest admission to our premises or immediately removing the offending member, vendor, or guest from the premises.

Video Surveillance

Please be advised that for security reasons, we may, in our discretion, regularly record certain areas in our spaces via video.

Children

At this time, we are not able to accommodate children. In instances of an emergency, we are accommodating for short durations in the workplace when a responsible parent is present at all times with them.

Our offices have a lot of high tech stuff and are not built with the safety of children in young age.

The Golden Rule

There are a number of different aspects to coworking etiquette, but it can really all be boiled down to the ‘Golden Rule’: treat others as you would like to be treated. If you use the shared space of a coworking environment in a way that respects the personal and professional needs of everyone who uses it, you are going to find that it is a much more comfortable and productive place for you to work in.