What is worth leaving home for?

We can work from almost anywhere now. From home, from a café, from the car between meetings, from wherever there happens to be decent Wi-Fi (or satellite). Technology has given us enormous freedom, and in many ways that has been a gift.

But it has also raised a question we keep coming back to.

If we no longer have to go somewhere to work, what makes a place worth going to?

Because if the answer is simply another desk, another chair and another internet connection, then staying home makes a fair bit of sense. A workplace has to offer something more.

For us, that something is people.

We are pretty passionate about this. We believe people thrive when they are around other people. Not through forced networking or endless organised interaction, but through the simple, ordinary experience of belonging somewhere and being known by the people around you.

An article by workplace designer Neill Johanson recently explored research from UNSW and Davenport Campbell into the value of physical workplaces, particularly the role of informal interactions, shared experiences and the learning that happens outside formal meetings. It struck a chord with me because we see it every day.

The useful conversation often isn't the one in the diary. It is the one that happens while making coffee or the question asked across the room. The introduction that happens because two people happened to be there at the same time. The quick check-in that turns into something more meaningful. Those moments someone notices that another person is having a rough day or need (another) coffee.

These things are easy to dismiss because they don't fit neatly into a productivity report, but they matter enormously.

Digital work is brilliant at helping us communicate with people we already know and complete the things we already know need doing. What it is less good at is creating the unexpected. It rarely introduces us to the conversation we didn't know we needed, the perspective outside our usual circle, or the person who might quietly change the direction of an idea.

Creativity needs some of that messiness. So does life!

For founders, creatives, entrepreneurs and small teams, this matters even more. Independence can be incredibly freeing, but it can also become isolating without us noticing. You can spend a whole day in calls, messages and emails and still feel like you've been working alone.

We've had people describe INNX as their safe place. Others have told us it feels like home. That they feel part of something bigger than the work sitting in front of them. These comments mean a lot to us because that is exactly the kind of place we hope to create.

Community, at least the way we see it, is not a room full of business cards. It is not a referral network and it's certainly not an endless calendar of networking events. It is people belonging to one another.

It is someone checking in because they know you've had a hard week. Someone lending a hand when something has gone wrong. Sharing knowledge because it might help. Celebrating a win. Sitting with somebody in a setback. Offering an introduction when it makes sense, but also offering time, encouragement, perspective or simply company when that is what is needed.

The work matters, but the person doing the work matters more. That is why we think place still matters too.

For a while, it felt like the future of work conversation was heading towards the idea that physical workplaces might become less relevant. Perhaps what has actually happened is that ordinary workplaces have become less relevant.

When you don't have to be somewhere, the places you choose need to mean something.

They need to give you something you cannot get by sitting alone at home.

A good workspace should let you concentrate when you need to concentrate and connect when you need to connect. There should be places to talk and places to retreat. Energy without constant noise. Community without pressure. Familiar faces without the feeling that you always have to perform.

And over time, something begins to happen. You stop simply sharing a building with other people and start sharing a little bit of life with them.

That is where we think the real value sits.

INNX has never been about squeezing as many desks as possible into a room. We want it to be a home base for people who are creating, questioning, building and trying things. A place where you can get your head down and do the work, but also lift your head occasionally and remember there are people around you doing the same.

You might come in to finish a proposal and leave having solved a problem because of a conversation you never planned to have. You might discover a collaborator, a client or a new idea. Or nothing commercially useful might happen at all.

You might just have a really good conversation with someone who gets it. That totally counts too.

The future of work will keep becoming more flexible, more distributed and more digital, and that's a good thing. But human beings have not suddenly stopped needing one another. We still learn from proximity. We still draw courage and energy from the people around us. We still need places where we can be known, contribute something and feel part of something beyond ourselves.

So maybe the question isn't whether people should return to the workplace. Maybe it is whether we are creating places worth returning to.

Places that feel human. Places that make room for belonging. Places that remind us that while we may be building different things, we don't have to build them alone.

That is the kind of place we want INNX to be.