Today our tour of coworking spaces around the world takes us to the heart of New Delhi, India, to visit a coworking space called Stirring Minds.
Stirring Minds explains its moniker and its mission thusly: “Stirring Minds is an initiative to support, help grow and nurture the entrepreneurial mind, ‘The Stirred One’ as we love to call it.”
At a glance, Stirring Minds would seem to be very like other coworking spaces popping up in cities across the globe. Its walls are painted with bright and trendy colors; a ping pong table and other diversions are provided along with coffee and tea in a comfortable lounge area; casually dressed “Stirred Ones” sit at flexible and permanent desk spaces, sharing ideas, bent over computers, or sitting around meetings tables, a community of thinkers and doers making things happen.
There are a few other things going on at Stirring Minds, though. For starters, besides the 8,000+ sq. ft. space described above, the coworking initiative also has what it calls a “node office” in the entrepreneur-loving, start-up incubation capital of the world, Silicon Valley. Their purpose in this, in their own words, is “to connect the Indian start-up ecosystem with that of the Valley”. Of course! Who wouldn’t want to connect their ecosystem with one of the most fertile on the planet?
But it takes more than an office in the right place to succeed at cross-pollination. It takes ideas, organization, leadership, and, lets face it, the right connections to get something off the ground.
Well, Stirring Minds has thought of that, too. So, in addition to the physical resources entrepreneurs need (like an address, internet connectivity, and a rooftop cafe), full time members at Stirring Minds also have access to the organization’s mentorship program, workshops with leading entrepreneurs, and even business support services like HR and IT help.
Now, Stirring Minds has only been around for about a year, so it is hard to say whether its intentions to connect its members with opportunities in other parts of the world will prove effective, but we sure do like that global spirit.
