The boardroom's shared space: a place for entrepreneurs to grow, connect, and collaborate.

• Author: Orr, Vanessa
• Position: Entrepreneurs

When Katherine Jernstrom and Brit Szymoniak first met each other while taking a tenmonth long leadership course in 2011, they realized that not only were they both dreamers and entrepreneurs at heart, but that they worked very well together. So when they decided to start a business, it was no surprise that they chose to create a company that focused on collaboration, enabling small business owners to cowork with others in a shared space.

The Boardroom, an eight thousand-square-foot office located on Fifth Avenue in Anchorage, provides individuals with the opportunity to run their businesses from a location where they are not only in the center of the Downtown community but are centered among a group of like-minded entrepreneurs.

"Prior to joining The Boardroom, I had a traditional office, but participated in some of the entrepreneurial events that were held here," says Stephen Trimble, president of Trimble Strategies LLC. "But the community that they were building here was so interesting that I wanted to be a part of it. I originally saw a vibrant place with a bunch of different companies working together in shared space, but once I got here and got to know people, I realized that co-working is a really powerful thing. Everyone here is developing their own business, but they're all going through the same process. It's like having a cohort of people who understand what you're going through, and it's a great resource, whether you want to ask what accounting software someone is using or collaborate on projects with other members."

The Coworking Model

Before opening The Boardroom, Jernstrom spent ten years working in the nonprofit sector, including serving as the community outreach director for Bean's Cafe. Szymoniak was the director of public affairs and business development for the Port of Anchorage. "Even though we were working at different jobs, Katherine and I were both interested in entrepreneurship and had been looking at different business models," says Szymoniak. "We both felt that it was important to give back to the community, and we also wanted to find a way to keep people here; we were tired of seeing the bright people we knew moving out of Anchorage."

The women looked to New York, San Francisco, and Seattle for innovative ideas and were attracted to the model of coworking, which enables people to share workspace while pursuing independent activities. They started The Boardroom in 2013 as a way to allow small businesses to grow...