1 General Description of the COVID-19 Influences on Coworking Spaces

Common feature of the COVID-19 pandemic in Slovakia, regardless of the wave, was the fact that mainly walk-ins and temporary residence were primarily affected. Community managers had to modify the availability for regular members to avoid new contacts and ensure social distancing. This fact left coworking spaces (CSs) with very limited options to manoeuvre through community development and a variety of events that had been ensured before the pandemic situation worsened. Keeping the regulars was of highest priority to be sustainable in the long run, primarily taking turbulent development and restrictions into account. Most CSs were affected by restrictions to operate in a limited mode, without communal rooms (coffee and relax rooms) and with substantial expenses on hygiene (disinfecting open spaces). More importantly, they had to modify open spaces to keep social distance between workstations, or there were plexiglass installations to minimise direct contact in open spaces. At the same time, coworkers were allowed to work from home. Due to the COVID-19 spikes at winter time, shared spaces were a subject to instability. Limited economic opportunities for freelancers and digital nomads raised several concerns regarding an ability to afford paying for their place. CSs managers are also unsure whether mid and large companies are able to pay the invoices to CSs members who are their suppliers [8]. This happened to be likewise, the case for large companies and their plans to move employees to CSs for cost reduction.

Nonetheless, there was a certain shift to move employees to available CSs or forming their own internal collaborative spaces. The return, however, was preceded by weeks of preparation with intensive internal communication and, hand in hand with it, the preparation of the premises themselves. Managers of CSs had to ensure cleaning the premises, including tables, furniture or touch surfaces, installing plexiglass where it is not possible to leave the necessary distance, providing drapes or disinfectants to increase hygiene at open spaces—especially after the second wave. The trend will be to combine offices with open space. According to HB Reavis and their survey [9] companies and people need space for community meetings, where CSs play a vital role. The survey revealed that large companies would now take advantage of available coworking space close to the company rather than cramming their project teams into their own existing space, even if it is only a temporary solution with the end of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Even though most restrictions were lifted, CSs in Slovakia registered a certain shift towards a compromise of home office and on-site presence. Some CSs users, whose nature of work allows it, will hold on to the compromise to combine home-office and presence in CSs. Others will use their fixed office space, and larger teams (corporate employees) will use the larger shared space we know today as open space and CSs amenities. More importantly, the pandemic sped up the process of workplace transformation with cost reduction. Compared to renting fully furnished offices, large and medium companies are seeking flexible and short-term lease agreements and an inspiring environment to kick-start a declining corporate culture [11].

More importantly, according to [11] most employees had significant problems with working conditions during the pandemic, a large percentage of respondents were considering changing jobs and the possibility of relocating because of the increased flexibility afforded by teleworking. Furthermore, the survey revealed most employees were not comfortable with long-term home office, but they are also not that interested in returning to their original setup and tend to prefer a combination of working from home and working from the office. Hence, CSs registered interest of companies to locate their employees in their open spaces, especially in those closely located to company premises. This eventually led to the hybridization of work in CSs. At the same time, CSs had to reassess the benefits and size of their amenities, and so-called hybrid places are taking shape. Process of hybridization was amplified by the third wave and after, which required flexibility to modify spaces and meet the needs of changing labour markets.

On the positive note, some CSs decided to develop amenities and activities contributing to flexibility and openness of collaborative spaces, namely Campus City and The Spot. Campus City could be considered an innovative hub with an award of innovative office by CBRE [3]. Hence, this CSs is nurturing both a transdisciplinary and an open environment for digital nomads and creative class. These CSs kicked off a sequence of transformations of work processes, but also of the offices themselves, while adapting the working environment to emerging demands and needs of coworkers [10]. This experience has given CSs a new perspective on the organisation of work, but also on the demands of users on the workspace. The pandemic period has also offered possibilities to strengthen community development as of a CW active in the community field—BASE4WORK Bratislava, was awarded a title “Co-Working Space of the Year” by Frame [7]. This evaluation was made by a jury of experts in the coworking movement. The award portrayed a picture of a thriving coworking movement in the capital city of Slovakia, despite the negative direct and indirect impacts of COVID-19 pandemic on CSs. Furthermore, the BASE4WORK was selected as an innovative office of 2021 by CBRE [4] due to the unique space that attracts innovative and creative companies. This CSs has the potential to create a unique creative hub in a revitalised national cultural landmark with more diverse stakeholders among members despite the COVID-19.

Therefore, some spaces have undergone a significant re-organization and will follow the global trends of flexible environments in the field of workplace strategies.

2 Public Support During the COVID-19

There were several initiatives from the public sector to aid both coworking spaces as enterprises and/or non-profit organisations and coworkers as legal entities, sole proprietors and micro businesses that struggled during the pandemic.

The state aid was delivered by various ministries responsible for industries including small and medium sized enterprises (Ministry of Economy of the Slovak Republic (SR), for financial matters and taxes (Ministry of Finance of SR), for employment support and social care [19] and for the support of cultural and creative industries many coworkers and coworking owners and managers belong to [17].

The Ministry of Finance proposed, and the Slovak government approved the so-called Lex corona 1, 2 and 3 legislation related to deferred income tax return and payments (on income tax, value-added tax), deferred Electronic Registration of Sales, filling various financial statements, stop of tax controls and tax executions, retroactive effect of tax loss, loan guarantees for entrepreneurs, waiver of interest on arrears and remission of tax advances [18].

The highest amount of state aid in order to mitigate Covid-19 impacts was delivered by the Ministry of Labour, Social Affairs and Family (MLSAF) with its scheme First Aid, First Aid+ , First Aid++ . By the end of February 2022, it reached the amount of 2475 billion Euro coming from the European Union Social Fund Operational programme Human Resources and every third working person received some support from this scheme oriented both on employers and on self-employed businesses. The amount of money received was different between various waves and actual First Aid conditions and varied between 270 and 628 Euro [19] with the highest amounts paid in the second pandemic wave (February–May 2021 with 572 Euro and 626 Euro respectively). It was oriented on partial reimbursement of employees’ wages in case of the closure or any restriction of employers’ or self-employed persons (in case they have employees) activity imposed by the Public Health Authority of the SR and also compensatory bonuses for self-employed persons and small businesses in case of closure, imposed restriction measures or decreases in sales. These payments were made with a delay of one or two months and their decrease in sales was in almost 50% of respondents much higher than the aid in the first wave [25]. One of the benefits of this aid was its distribution mainly to micro businesses (44%), while at the beginning of the pandemic large companies prevailed and only since September 2020 (second wave) microbusinesses started to overcome them. Another positive aspect was an introduction of a long-awaited permanent job protection system called Kurzarbiet introduced to the Slovak legislation in March 2022 replacing the First Aid. Its aim is to support employers in order to secure jobs for employees in the form of working hours shortening because of an adverse situation that he could not prevent or foresee while 60% out of at least 80% monthly wage paid by the employer is covered from the state budget in order to avoid dismissal [14]. Another large scheme was attendance allowance (nursing benefits) for employed and/or self-employed parents when they have to stay with their sick children at home.

The Ministry of Economy offered rent subsidies and payments related to Covid-19 testing of the employers in large firms.

The most criticised tool was support for entrepreneurs from cultural and creative industries (CCIs). Only after several protests from the business entities and publicly known personalities, inviting experts to the process, establishing dialogue instead of fighting each other thanks to other factors the situation improved step-by-step and since November 2020 legal possibilities widen and several new schemes only for this sector have been adopted. The webpage helpingculture (pomahamekulture.sk) was created in order to find all schemes suitable for CCIs. The very first and specifically oriented on this sector was Decreasing of Negative Impacts of Crisis Situation on Culture launched in December 2020 and First Aid schemes were adopted to CCIs representatives’ needs. Main schemes came into force in the year 2021 whereas many of them were the same regardless of the applicant, some of them varied for employees and individuals, self-employed, companies and non-profit organisations. A scheme Covid Subsidy for Professionals Working in the CCI Industry and calls 4–8/2021 from various organisations of the MoC, while companies were also eligible for Subsidy for Micro, Small and Medium-sized Enterprises in the Area of CCI (granted by the Ministry of Economy) and MoC Subsidy for single-person Ltd. Companies; non-governmental organisations for Covid subsidies for NGOs operating in culture. In total 111.8 mil. Euro was allocated as a help for CCIs of which almost 60% came from MLSAF First Aid schemes allocated for CCIs [17].

Several initiatives promoting West–East divide were regional and city level support schemes. In addition, the Slovak Business Agency as the central government body belonging to the Ministry of Economy promoted its Coworking programme [24] coming from pre-Covid times as a start-up and acceleration initiative for individuals who have a potential business idea that should be developed under the supervision of relevant experts. The distinction from the pre-pandemic time is a longer acceleration period: instead of 4 months, it was for 6 months in 2021. It has been supported only for Bratislava capital city as this scheme has spatial and personal possibilities in the headquarters of this institution. Another initiative that is worth mentioning for a more complete picture of CSs development during the pandemic in Slovakia, titled “Coworkings open free of charge for women who want to start their own business”. As the name suggests, this initiative is multi-lateral—to support new start-ups and to accommodate female entrepreneurs in supportive communities [26]. More importantly, it was a grass root initiative from managers with mutual agreement in Slovak CSs. The support for female entrepreneurs is based on the mentoring programme to run sustainable business and at the same time contribute to local community development.

Foundation of the city of Bratislava with its community activities and scholarship programme for individuals, self-employed and companies were introduced in the second pandemic wave. Trenčín town in the western part of the country has its own Subsidies for Activities in the Area of Culture and Artistic Activities and also eastern second largest regional centre Prešov Call for Microprogram of Prešov self-governing region—program Culture both suitable for self-employed and in case of companies it also offered Call for Prešov Regional Government—Culture [13]. Companies have even one additional scheme from Bratislava city: Grant Programme Culture—cultural spaces [20]. It is worth mentioning that above-mentioned schemes at regional and local levels have offered understandably and substantially lower amounts of money than those at the state level.

3 From Coworking Cooperation to Institutionalized Networking

One of the aspects Covid-19 brought was in certain time to work from home and as a consequence many people returned back to their hometown and commuted only once in a while due to work meetings in larger towns in Slovakia or in the Czech Republic [12]. Independently-run (or also known as community) CSs not supported by their mother companies started to cooperate and launched a joint initiative Work where you are (in slovak Pracuj tam, kde práve si) regardless of location where a person is present at the moment, as seen in Fig. 1.

Fig. 1
A collage of 9 photographs arranged in a rectangle around text in a foreign language. All photographs display various working spaces with modern, colorful furniture, bright lighting, and wood furnishing. Some of the workspaces have wood floors. 2 of the photographs are of conference rooms with one large table in the center. A few others are of open plan office floors, with small desks and chairs arranged around them in various areas on the large floor. A few photographs feature people at work, or in meetings around the desks.

Source Cvernovka coworking Facebook page https://www.facebook.com/coworkingcvernovka/photos/a.657463271108937/1590639674457954/. Copyright is provided by the Coworking Slovakia association

Work where you are (Pracuj tam, kde práve si) initiative.

Full size image

It was started by women owners and/or managers of CSs in the capital city Bratislava and nearby regional capital Trnava and announced in February 2021. Altogether 17 coworking spaces were involved across the country representing all regions, while 5 of them have been from the capital city and 3 from the Eastern part (not Košice directly). This initiative has have twofold aim: first towards the public to help coworkers to find at one place some basic information about coworking spaces: where the space is located, number of various types of desks, such as hot/flexi and fixed desks, number of offices, the occupancy rate of various types of spaces and what services are on offer. Respective prices for such spaces with detailed information on what is included (benefits e.g. coffee and/or tea, small fruit for free or for reduced price) and what has to be paid separately (e.g. phone boots, meeting rooms) was also provided. Second aim is to help providers of the CSs to share best practices and/or know how to run such spaces as work/job flexibility will be more and more important in the coming days. During other COVID-19 waves, those CSs involved in the initiative also shared several online educational activities mostly streamed from Bratislava coworking spaces as they had partners (e.g. NGOs of banks and/or international companies) who financially covered such service and their collaboration successfully continued. The initiative Work where you are was built from the bottom as a grass root project and was based on voluntary contributions of dedicated time, effort and willingness to collaborate. Independently run coworking spaces have also lacked an official institution or association to help to share their knowledge and to represent their interests neither towards the coworking community, nor to general public and public administration bodies. Natural outcome of this voluntary collaboration was the project supported by the grant from Active Citizen Fund—Slovakia with the aim of strengthening the capacity and societal contribution of community coworkings in Slovakia started in November 2021 and announced the Association of coworking spaces (in slovak Asociácia coworkingových centier) officially started to operate in May 2022 under the name Coworking Slovakia [1, 12]. CSs involved in the project have been meeting on a monthly basis either online or in person and they have been working on an awareness campaign, human resources strategy and adaptation of business to current post pandemic conditions. Other activities involve creating workshops and lectures for other coworking spaces and writing a manual for freshly started coworking spaces [1].

4 COVID-19 and the West–East Divide

In order to make a clear picture we acknowledge the classification of metropolitan areas by OECD [21] concerning the number of inhabitants, where Bratislava (west) is considered a sole Metropolitan area in the country. Additionally, Kosice (east) is the only Medium-sized urban area, while other regions are considered Small urban areas. Here we consider the eastern part of the country consisting of two NUTS 2 regions Košický kraj and Prešovský kraj as representatives of the periphery and consequently Bratislava as a representative of the centre. According to [23], at the end of 2019 there were 55 coworking spaces operating in 24 Slovak cities. It means opening up of 31 new CSs in the period 2015–2019 while they spread to 13 towns and cities without any such space before. These spaces largely operating not only in regional centres or in their proximity but also in smaller towns across Central (Banskobystrický kraj) and Eastern (Košický kraj and Prešovský kraj) Slovakia.

The question of how scale and scope of events organised by and in CSs changed between the pre-pandemic and pandemics periods while assuming decrease in in-person events and consequently increase in virtual events as their substitutes is being tackled. Therefore we compare pre-pandemic period with pandemic periods—first wave separately and other waves jointly together as we suppose the highest changes in the pre-pandemic to first wave periods and slow adapting and establishing of new normal in other waves. The first wave started in March 10 (in the capital city even a week earlier) and for 6 weeks, the economy was complete closed. Then in the several phases loosening of measures ended up in June 2020 (March–September 2020). As the number of dead rates and number of hospitalized patients rose significantly, second wave was officially announced and since 24 October a curfew for ten days was announced while several exceptions, such as the way to work. The measures were released by November 16th. During that time several coworking spaces were closed, but most of them remained open. January 1st 2021 lockdown conditions became even harder and the government ordered work from home for everyone who can work from home. Easing of the strict measures lead to slow end of the second wave in June 2021 (October 2020–June 2021). Even though data pointed at a start of the third wave at the end of July 2021 [22], it was officially announced at the end of September 2021 and lasted until the end of February 2022. Our assumption regarding the events is that due the pandemic they moved from physical activities toward online events. Community CSs in the capital city Bratislava and peripheral Košický kraj and Prešovský kraj are in the centre of scale and scope of events while Facebook profiles of the CSs were used to analyse and summarize posted events. We divided events into three categories as [16] did:

  1. 1.

    Internal physical activities that occurred inside the CSs

  2. 2.

    External physical activities that occurred in the external environment of CSs

  3. 3.

    Virtual activities.

In regards to the pre-pandemic period, considerably more events were organised in the capital city localised in the western part. This enormous difference could be caused by the existence of a coworking space specialised in events and also a presence of a large number of business entities (e.g. almost ½ of cultural and creative sector firms [2] of various sizes from start-ups, sole proprietors, micro-businesses to large multinationals with headquarters in Bratislava city those events are oriented to. Another target audience is the general public as some events’ topics are also devoted to personal development issues, soft skills, women on maternity leaves and their needs, leisure-oriented activities such as yoga classes, health related lectures and seminars and some are for secondary and/or university students as possible future clients. Interestingly enough, most eastern localised CSs used external premises for (co)organising their events and focused on certain types of community (e.g. architects, IT specialists) while in the case of the capital city in-house events dominated with previously mentioned wide audiences.

This situation radically changed by the COVID-19 pandemic. We would like to dive into eastern part with medium-sized and small urban areas in Slovakia, where the coworking scene overcame the adversity and challenges caused by the pandemic. To be more specific, we would like to highlight CSs that changed their activities in a considerable way to cope with the restrictions and limited space to manoeuvre. It is worth to mention, most coworking spaces located in the east intensified their activities for community cohesion during the first and second waves of the pandemic. Most of these activities were organised in their own premises despite various restrictions affecting social distancing. CSs were focused primarily on community-oriented events (coffee together, yoga) during the second and third wave. We assume these efforts were part of coworking strategies for coworker retention in a systematic way. Interestingly, as Marchevkova [15] mentioned, during the third wave CSs in the east switched to virtual events (60% or 50% respectively), and only a limited number of physical events (40% and 50% respectively) took place in-house, such as exhibitions, workshops for members and the public.

No external events were organised by any CSs, which may be due to the fact that community managers did not want to put their members at risk. Interestingly, most CSs were more active in organising events compared to the pre-pandemic period, even though events are not the main source of income. The pandemic put a pressure on communities to be more creative and engage in diverse activities (online coffee talks, breaks etc.). Second wave accelerated the transition to virtual space as 60% of events were held online to engage with the communities in CSs. Shifts in organising events were reflected in structural changes as most CSs in the east provided a limited number of flexi desks to maintain social distancing and group cohesion. Marchevkova [15] mentioned most coworking owners/managers did not apply for any financial subsidies mentioned in previous subchapter 1.2. Only one space applied for financial subsidy to cover rent with a successful application in aid packages such as (First Aid, First Aid+ or First Aid++ ). Moreover, membership fees financed most of these CSs and managers mentioned prices for members did not change even though they could cover almost 90% of fixed costs. Variable costs during the pandemic were identified in the case of purchasing necessary equipment to stream and organize virtual events (audio and video technology).

The CSs in the capital city as western representatives were, similarly to the eastern counterparts, closed for six weeks period ordered by government. Some of them rushed to open their premises, some remained closed and open gradually firstly solely for their office rented coworkers, lately for renting fixed desks and finally for those coming to the open space. Obligatory hygienic measures were obeyed in every wave and lead to some spatial changes mentioned earlier. Number of all events decreased radically (more than four times) in the first wave and was almost equally divided to internal physical events and online events. Managers/owners in the interviews between March–May 2021 claimed that firstly they stopped events completely and then moved their activities into online form mostly until the ease of the closure or strict movement measures application when in-house events started to prevail (mainly in the summer and at the beginning of autumn) and people attended in person. As in some CSs most of educational and training events have been free they were able to organise them either online or in person only with the support of partners (NGO of large multinational companies, banks etc.) and these partners were supportive and understanding during the pandemic. Many such online events were cross-streamed among CSs involved in the coworking association (see Sect. 3). Informal community events were squeezed to minimum, but increased interaction via social media (e.g. articles on how to deal with various aspects of pandemic in business), newsletter or emails together with support and consultations (financial, legal…) stepped in. Later on online yoga classes were added to the offer and only in minority cases online coffee/breakfast. On the other hand, almost every coworking has been helping to build a community with the NGOs, local people or have been involved in charity events on a regular basis and this continued in various forms through pandemics (e.g. online charity event, various campaigns, and continuous support of My Buddy programme). Some CSs located directly or not far from the city centre reported increase in renting meeting rooms as other possibilities to meet business partners were closed.

Most coworking spaces have been hit hard financially so firstly they contacted property owners to arrange any rent deferment, rent decrease or other form of rent subsidies and mostly they were successful. In case of any rent decrease from their property owners, they also decreased payments for offices or fixed desks for their coworkers to help them to remain in the space that was important for CSs having many firms oriented on organising events. In spite of it, many of such firms left CSs unable to pay their invoices and newcomers caused a large change in coworking community. As only a few spaces were eligible for deferred rent from state authorities and those who applied also got it, this measure was not much used in the beginning but became more popular in the second and third waves. Reimbursement of the wage costs of employees offered by MLSAF was also benefited in one interviewed CSs. What is important to mention is the behaviour of the coworkers. Many of them have kept to pay their (office or fix desk) rent also in the periods of the closure or impossibilities to come in person to the space as they wanted to have their place guaranteed but often also to support “their CW”. The coworking space oriented on events received coworkers support in a form of online quizzes with voluntary contribution to the CS space.

As Table 1 reveals, the number of events declined even more in the second and third waves in comparison to the first wave taking half a year. It might be partially affected by several coworking spaces launching training and education programmes consisting of several meetings but was promoting on Facebook only once and thus counted only once. Some of them were also in both online and on-site modes according to actual pandemic situation.

Table 1 Independently-run CSs in Slovakia and types and number of events in pre-pandemic and all pandemic periods
Full size table

5 Concluding Remarks

Slovakia was one of the countries heavily impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic. At the beginning, the government imposed very strict measures and closed the whole country for a month and a half that affected the economic and employment slump (GDP decline was more than 5% similarly to Spain, Italy and France [5]. Independently run coworking spaces as one of the business entities felt a strong impact on their operation and activities, which was the focus of this chapter.

The closure and a slow reopening disabled the presence of coworkers on site. Therefore, the number of physical events dropped sharply, and the potential was seen in the online events, mainly educational and training types (e.g. courses, webinars). This evolution was confirmed in central metropolitan area of the capital city Bratislava but opposite happened in rural non-metropolitan areas represented by eastern part of Košice and Prešov regions where the number interestingly increased. Understandable decrease in the number of community activities forced CSs to be more creative and offered a seldom-used online coffee breaks or online breakfast for in-house communities. Contradictory, communities outside the individual CS have been strengthen by cooperation among several CSs across the country and lead to creation of formal association of coworking spaces. It also helped to cross-stream many virtual events, especially educational and training oriented, from Bratislava to other small-sized cities. Generally, the number of online activities rose substantially, and percentage rate increased by each of the following wave. Coworking spaces were also supported by their coworkers as many of them did not cancel membership even in the complete closure and paid their fees in order to secure their office or space. The government also offered several types of supporting tools in order to mitigate the COVID-19 impact but only a few spaces used rent subsidies and/or reimbursement of the wage costs of employees, mainly those located in the capital.

On the positive note, these difficult pandemic years 2020–2022 were also seen as a challenge to change some modes of operation, marketing strategies to attract new coworkers instead of previously granted business entities and invest mainly in ICT devices. New coworking spaces have started to work not only in the capital city both as large coworking spaces (e.g. The Spot [27]) or as the local representative of international chain (e.g. Collabor8), but also in non-metropolitan areas (e.g. Fabrika 48 in Košice region [15]). This trend also emphasis the role of the coworking spaces as the hybrid third places option and help to enable more workers to become more flexible at work possibilities.