Knoxville Overground Downtown Center

It looks as though the Knoxville Overground is pushing forward and looking to create a downtown workspace along with their Sequoyah Hills office. Below is the latest post from Knoxviews.com.

35 Market Square could be a micro-enterprise development center modeled off of one in San Francisco

In the midst of our recession, the non-profit organization Knoxville Overground continues to push forward with its grassroots campaign to build resources for triple-bottom line entrepreneurs and self-employed professionals in the greater Knoxville area with the message “passion is recession-proof.”

Tomorrow on Wednesday March 25th at 7pm, Knoxville Overground will host a social mixer at 35 Market Square as well as provide tours of the 5,000 sq. ft. facility it hopes to convert into a micro-enterprise development center within the next few months.

Their proposal, modeled off of the top-ranked San Francisco Renaissance Center, entails using the space as a resource where startups in a variety of industries (specifically companies positioned to bring in the majority of their revenue from outside Tennessee) can grow around a community of other startups, self-employed professionals, and organization representatives that specifically serve the startup community.

The last social event hosted by Knoxville Overground was the grand opening of its entrepreneur community center and coworking workspace last month (free for members to use who qualify and pay $49/year) at 1204 Kenesaw in Sequoyah Hills. The event attracted over 101 guests from the startup community, investment firms, and the economic development sector.

For more information, please e-mail knoxvilleoverground@gmail.com.

If you are a self-employed person who is looking for a good way to get out of the Home Office, then I would suggest checking out this organization.

Possibly Related Posts:

• Interesting Pay Scale
• Warranty Schmarranty
• Pecan Party :: Carnage
• Site of the Week: CouponKatie.com
• Site of the Week: Misc Bytes.com

Coworking in Knoxville

A good thing about working for yourself can be the independence that it provides. But, some of the bad things about working for yourself can be the solitude and the lose of the ability to bounce ideas off others. Well, my wife was looking around Facebook a few weeks back and ran across a Group called CoWorking Knoxville and thought it would be up my alley.

Here’s how Coworking Knoxville describes themselves:

We’re a group of free-lancers, Web programmers, self-employed professionals, self-unemployed entrepreneurs, and various independent types who meet once a week in West Knoxville.

Rather than work out of home or solo out of a coffee shop, when we get together we share ideas, connections, resources, and strategies that help everyone grow their businesses and free up their time. We also introduce each other to new contacts and friends.

Coworking is one of the fastest-growing movements redefining the way we work across the country and has been featured in the past few months in Mother Jones magazine and The New York Times.

I decided to see what they were about so I joined the group on facebook and was invited to their weekly “meet up”. Since they don’t have their own meeting place they borrow space at a local Panera Bread. (If you’ve ever been to a Panera at lunch time then you know it’s a mad house!) I’ll have to say, I hate being “the new guy” in anything. Especially in something where you know no one and are meeting in a crazy restaurant. But I found them and all was well.

Although I didn’t get any work done (Although I did notice they would not bother you if you had work to do during this time), I did learn quite a bit about the coworking movement and met a good group of people. The group has plans plans to rent a space downtown in the future to use as an “office” for it’s members. They are calling this Knoxville Overground Ground and it sounds very exciting.

I don’t know what else I could say but that you should really check this organization out for yourself. The Coworking Knoxville Group meets every Wednesday from 12:00 to 4:00 at the Panera Bread at 4485 Kingston Pike Knoxville, Tennessee. This could truly be a great resource for any self-employed person.

Oh, and I can’t forget to point you to the website of one of the members, his passion for Fight Club has motivated him into creating some “Rules for Coworking“. That whole site is well worth a read!

Possibly Related Posts:

• Site of the Week: CouponKatie.com
• Site of the Week: Misc Bytes.com
• New Site: JustUsLeeg
• Internet Radio on the Brink!
• Knoxville Overground Downtown Center