THE MOST POWERFUL community dynamic I have enjoyed in Ireland stemmed from monthly Open Coffee Meetups in Limerick. I want to rekindle that energy by layering the Open Coffee dynamic inside the Grow Remote movement and I think I will try to do this in Clonmel, County Tipperary, Ireland in 2019.
I get my inspiration from Tracy Keogh and the Grow Remote website. I'm quoting this inspiration content:
The Idea of Grow Remote
There are over 200,000 remote workers in Ireland and most of these people don't know each other. The aim of Grow Remote is to build a community and ecosystem around that number and then grow it so that we can increase the number of employment opportunities available in local communities across the country. Grow Remote Local Chapters can connect remote jobs, remote workers and local communities.
The Grow Remote community consists of co-working managers, freelancers, nomads, remote workers and remote working companies who believe that all three-- jobs, workers and communities--need to move together to enable our communities to thrive.
A Perfect Place for Digital Nomads
The aim of Grow Remote is to uncover and build a full community around remote working. To do that we need the infrastructure (spaces, broadband, online connection platforms), the people (community leaders & advocates) and the resources (education, tools to make this local or funding).
For companies, attracting and retaining talent is their primary challenge. Often they struggle to recruit and retain people with the skills and knowledge they need while for remote workers, lack of a real world community is their biggest challenge. Many workers are isolated at home and many more would join the remote working world if they knew of the employment opportunities available.
In parallel, rural communities are suffering often due to an over reliance on few sectors for employment. Building a thriving remote working community in any town or village presents a great opportunity for both economic development and the social landscape of the town.
So if I can get the buy-in from several champions in County Tipperary, I will either establish or contribute to a Grow Remote local chapters. I can feel the energy building for the network of remote working in Ireland.
[Bernie Goldbach teaches creative media for business on the Clonmel Digital Campus.]
