{"type":"rich","version":"1.0","provider_name":"Transistor","provider_url":"https://transistor.fm","author_name":"Coworking Values Podcast","title":"How Contingent Works Educated Their Local Council on Coworking – From Invisible to Indispensable with Ewan Buck","html":"","width":"100%","height":180,"duration":1934,"description":"\"It wasn't because they weren't listening – it was because they weren't educated. Once that penny drops, they're super helpful.\"Ewan Buck\nTired of running yourself into the ground?\nThen stop running alone.\nOn February 24th, the London Coworking Assembly presents Unreasonable Connection Goes Live!—a one-day working session for the people running London’s most vital neighbourhood spaces and the public sector allies working to help them thrive. It’s a day to share the load, find real solutions, and build a new playbook, together.\nEwan Buck has been working on Contingent Works since 2018. The space opened on Bromley High Street in late 2020, weeks before England’s second lockdown.\nFor the first four years, the council didn’t get it.\nNot because they were hostile. Because they’d never seen what a coworking space actually does. They work in dull corporate offices. They don’t know what it looks like when freelancers and micro-businesses find each other, share leads, and build something together.\nSo Ewan did what Gerald from a Brixton coworking assembly told him worked: he educated them. Slowly. Persistently. For four years.\nHe dragged councillors into the space. He introduced them to members. He let them see faces light up over laptop screens on a Friday afternoon when central London offices sat empty.\nThen the personnel changed. Someone new arrived in the department and asked the obvious question: “Oh, you’ve got a coworking space on the high street? That’s really handy.”\nOnce the penny dropped, they were super helpful.\nNow Contingent Works runs an accelerator programme with Goldsmiths University. Ten scaling companies get monthly mentoring. Regular networking events bring local businesses together. The MP is scheduled to visit in February.\nBut here’s the part that stopped Bernie mid-conversation:\nA member, Jack, wrote to the MP. Without telling Ewan. Without being asked.\n“I don’t know why you’re not here. I don’t know why you don’t support this place. It’s absolutely...","thumbnail_url":"https://img.transistorcdn.com/WIBJeL0fXbpb8oNZHEtSu5qeC3870OdCYV3XNCIVY1M/rs:fill:0:0:1/w:400/h:400/q:60/mb:500000/aHR0cHM6Ly9pbWct/dXBsb2FkLXByb2R1/Y3Rpb24udHJhbnNp/c3Rvci5mbS8yZTBm/NGQ1N2YzYTcyNmE3/NTc2ZmU5NTBlYmNj/OTEwOC5wbmc.webp","thumbnail_width":300,"thumbnail_height":300}