Regular Practice: Blockchain Community Co-working Session
Article ID: BP-LLE-2026-001
Abstract: Community co-working sessions create sustained engagement through regular, low-pressure gatherings where participants work on their own projects while benefiting from shared space, peer support, and collective momentum. This pattern, refined over seven years in blockchain developer communities, prioritizes doing over discussing, maintain consistency through working side-by-side. Their co-working sessions focus on creating conditions where real work happens, connections form naturally, and participants leave with tangible progress. The key is starting small with people already doing projects, meeting regularly in comfortable spaces, structuring time to balance focused work with social connection, and keeping the barrier to entry low. Although this approach may seem less impressive than large events or structured workshops, it builds the sustained relationships and consistent progress that keep community initiatives alive over years.
Understanding Co-working Sessions
When we talk about co-working sessions, we mean regular gatherings where people work on their own projects in the same physical space. This is different from meetings where people only talk, classes where someone teaches, or networking events where people exchange cards. In co-working sessions, participants actually do work and make some progresses.
Think about studying in a library versus studying alone in your room. The library does not teach you or force you to work. But something about being surrounded by other focused people helps you concentrate. You feel less alone. When you need a break, you can see others taking breaks too. If you get stuck, you might ask the person next to you for help. The library creates conditions that make studying easier without directly controlling your studying.
Community co-working sessions work the same way. They create conditions that make project work easier without directly controlling what people work on. The value comes from working alongside others, not from structured instruction or formal presentations. People who work better in this environment will join and benefit from these co-working sessions.
This idea applies beyond technical projects. Any community initiative that requires sustained effort over time faces the same challenges: isolation when working alone, difficulty maintaining momentum, lack of peer support, and trouble staying motivated. Co-working sessions address these challenges through regular practice rather than occasional inspiration.
Who Comes First
The foundation of successful co-working sessions is starting with people who are already doing projects. This seems obvious but many groups tried to organize sessions to find projects for people who want to get involved. In blockchain community the approach of getting people who are already doing project has been proved to be a path to success by automatically enable others to find a project to get involved.
Think of it like starting a running club. You could recruit people who think they might want to start running someday, or you could recruit people who already run but do so alone. The second group will keep showing up because running is already their habit. They just want company while doing it. The first group may stop coming as soon as running feels hard because they have not built the habit yet.
Community co-working sessions will need participants who have already committed to working on something. Maybe they are building a website for their neighborhood association. Maybe they are learning design skills for their organizing work. Maybe they are creating educational materials for local schools. The specific project matters less than the fact that they are already motivated to make progress.
This means your first invitation list should focus on people you know who are actually doing things. Do not invite people based on who they are or what positions they hold. Invite people based on what they are currently working on.
Starting with friends makes this easier. When the first session includes people who already know each other, conversations flow more naturally. Participants feel comfortable asking for help. The atmosphere stays relaxed rather than formal. Later, when you invite newcomers, you can tell them who will be there. "Maria is coming, she's working on the community garden website" helps people decide to join because they can picture the gathering rather than imagining an abstract event.
If the person showing up is someone who knows a lot of people or is well-known, it will make inviting others easier. You can say, for example, “Maria is coming — you know, she’s the community garden person.” When people know that their friends or familiar faces are joining the event, it adds credibility and makes them more likely to participate.
Space and Timing
Where you meet matters almost as much as who attends. The right space makes co-working feel natural. The wrong space creates barriers that prevent people from focusing or returning.
Many groups assume they need dedicated office space or formal meeting rooms. However, after years of practice, the blockchain community has found that places like cafés and other public spaces often work better for community co-working sessions. They have the everything you need - tables, chairs, power outlets, internet, bathrooms, beverages - without extra cost. And they already feel comfortable because people visit them for various reasons.
The key is approaching cafe owners with clear expectations. Do not ask for special treatment or free space. Instead, explain what you are organizing and ask about their slow times. Most cafes have periods when few customers visit. Bringing a group during those hours potentially increases their sales without disrupting their busy times.
Here is how this conversation might sound: "Hi, I'm organizing a group that meets to work on community projects. We need tables for about two to three hours. When is your cafe usually quiet? We'd like to come then. People will buy coffee and snacks if they want, but working is the main thing. Would this work for you?"
This approach respects the cafe owner's business while finding space that works for your group. Many cafe owners appreciate regular customers who come during slow periods. Over time, as they get to know your group, they often become actively supportive.
Consistency in location matters more than finding the perfect space. Using the same place builds relationship with the owner, helps participants know where to go, and creates a sense of ritual. "Saturday afternoon at Corner Cafe" becomes a known pattern. This reliability makes participation easier because people can turn it into a weekly or bi-weekly routine.
Timing works the same way. Pick a day and time, then stick to it. Every week or every two weeks works better than monthly because the sessions become a habit rather than an occasional event. The specific time matters less than the consistency. Some groups meet weekend afternoons. Others meet weekday evenings. Choose based on when your core participants can reliably attend, then keep that schedule even when attendance varies.
Session Structure
How you structure the time during sessions affects whether people do real work or just have nice conversations.
The basic challenge is balancing focused work time with social connection time. Too much focus and the session feels isolating - people might as well work alone at home. Too much socializing and nothing gets done - people feel their time was wasted. The structure needs to support both elements while making clear which is happening when.
Here is a structure that has worked in practice suggested by blockchain community organizer, adapted for a typical session:
Opening (15 minutes) - Everyone briefly says their name and what they plan to work on today. Keep this short. The goal is awareness, not detailed discussion. People need to know who is working on what so they can ask for help later or identify potential collaborations.
First Work Block (60-90 minutes) - Everyone focuses on their own project. Talking is fine, but the default is quiet focused work. This is the longest continuous block because getting into focused work takes time. Interrupting after five minutes would waste that momentum.
Food and Sharing (30 minutes) - Take a break together. Eat simple food. Take turns briefly showing what you worked on. You can show progress, explain a problem you are stuck on, or ask for specific input. Sharing is optional. This break serves multiple purposes: rest for brains that have been focusing, social connection that makes the gathering feel communal, and knowledge sharing that might help someone's second work block.
Second Work Block (60-90 minutes) - Return to focused work.
Break and Connect & Closing - Quick round where each person mentions what they finished or decided today. Announce the next session date. People can have one-on-one conversations, exchange contact information, or discuss working together outside the sessions.
This structure works because it acknowledges how human attention and energy actually function. Ninety minutes is about the maximum most people can focus intensely on cognitive work. The food break comes right when people need rest, and combining it with sharing makes the break feel purposeful rather than wasteful. The second work block can be shorter because mental resources are already depleted, but it should be still long enough to capitalize on momentum and fresh ideas from the sharing.
The structure also creates natural moments for different kinds of interaction. Brief spoken sharing reaches everyone at once. The final break allows deeper one-on-one conversations. The work blocks respect people's need to focus without constant interruption.
What this structure does not include is equally important. There are no presentations or lectures. There is no agenda beyond individual work. There is no formal instruction. These elements all have value in other contexts, but they undermine the core purpose of co-working sessions, which is creating conditions for doing rather than discussing or learning about doing.
The Host Role
The job for co-working session hosts is creating conditions for good work and good connections. A good dinner party host makes sure guests feel welcome, introduces people who should meet each other, keeps glasses filled, and maintains the flow of the evening. Co-working session hosts has similar role.
Here are the host's main responsibilities:
Connect people to each other - Notice when two people are working on similar problems or when one person has skills another person needs. Make introductions. "John is also learning design, you should talk to him during the break." The host sees the whole room while everyone else focuses on their own work.
Keep the rhythm - Give time warnings before transitions. "Ten minutes until sharing time." Start and end each segment roughly on schedule. The structure only works if someone maintains it. But this does not mean being rigid. If people are deeply focused, letting the work block run five minutes long is fine. The point is creating predictability, not enforcing rules.
Watch and offer help - Notice who looks stuck or frustrated. Notice who seems disengaged. Asking "How's it going?" or "Need any help?" creates an opening for people to ask questions without feeling like they are interrupting. Sometimes people need permission to ask for help or to take a break.
Handle logistics - Arrive early to claim tables if needed. Bring extension cords if the cafe has limited outlets. Manage the group chat or message list. Send reminders before sessions. These small tasks keep things running smoothly.
What the host does not need to do:
Teach or lecture - The host is not there to transfer knowledge to everyone else. If someone asks a question the host cannot answer, connecting them with someone who knows is better than pretending to know.
Have all the skills - The best host might be someone with project management skills rather than technical skills. Understanding how to facilitate group process matters more than understanding how to code or design.
Talk constantly - Good hosting often means staying quiet and letting others work and connect. Being comfortable with silence during work blocks is important.
Solve everyone's problems - The host creates conditions for peer support, not personal support from the host to everyone else. When someone is stuck, the first response might be "Has anyone else dealt with this issue?" rather than trying to solve it yourself.
This lighter touch approach to hosting makes the role sustainable. If hosting requires being the expert who helps everyone for three hours, most people will burn out quickly. If hosting means facilitating connections and maintaining rhythm, many people can do it and the role can rotate over time.
Consistency and Growth
One of the hardest decisions for community organizers is resisting the pressure to grow quickly. We often assume bigger is better - more participants, more publicity, more ambitious programming. For co-working sessions, this assumption causes problems.
Think about the difference between a plant and a firework. A firework creates a spectacular display that attracts attention, then disappears. A plant grows slowly and steadily, surviving through seasons, becoming stronger over time. Community co-working sessions should be plants, not fireworks.
This means prioritizing consistency over growth. Meeting every week with five people builds more lasting value than meeting once with fifty people. The five people who attend regularly develop trust, learn each other's skills, build actual relationships, and make consistent progress on their projects. The fifty people who attend once get inspired but then return to working alone.
Consistency in schedule matters most. Pick a frequency you can maintain even during hard times. Weekly is ideal if possible because it creates a strong habit. Every two weeks works if weekly feels overwhelming. Monthly is too infrequent - too much time passes between sessions for momentum to build or relationships to deepen.
This does not mean deliberately keeping groups small. It means letting growth happen naturally through people inviting people rather than through publicity campaigns. When someone has a good experience at a co-working session, they tell friends who are also working on projects. Those friends come and have good experiences. They tell their friends. This organic growth creates a group where everyone knows at least one other person, which maintains the comfortable atmosphere even as the group expands.
Instead of publicly advertising sessions and trying to attract as many people as possible, target someone well-known to show up once in a while to facilitate organic growth. Inviting people who may be in their social network will be more effective than a public campaign.
Lecture and Learning
At some point, inviting an experienced developer, designer, or organizer to help participants can be good. This instinct makes sense but requires careful handling to avoid undermining what makes co-working sessions work.
Here is when and how to add expert participation for a win-win result:
Build audiences first - Usually this takes three to six sessions with ten to fifteen regular attendees. Once people expect to do real work each time, adding an expert participant will not shift the core culture. And having people in the room demonstrating their impact will make it easier for host to invite the experts.
Frame their participation clearly - Tell invited experts explicitly that you are not asking them to give a lecture. You want them to work alongside participants and offer advice when asked. Some experts enjoy this lighter touch role because it lets them work on their own projects while contributing to the community.
Use a light workshop format - The expert might share one concrete example from their experience for fifteen or twenty minutes at the start, then during work time they circulate to see what people are doing and offer specific advice. This is more like a coach moving between players during practice than a teacher giving a lesson to the whole class.
Keep it occasional - Having an expert participant every fourth or fifth session maintains the benefit without creating dependency. If experts attend every session, regular participants start waiting for expert answers rather than developing their own problem-solving skills and peer support networks.
Focus on showing rather than telling - The best expert input comes from working through specific problems people are currently facing rather than general presentations about best practices. "Let me look at your code and we'll debug together" teaches more than "Here's how to debug code" because it addresses a real immediate need.
The goal is supplementing the peer learning that happens naturally in co-working sessions, not replacing it with expert instruction.
Online Connection
Co-working sessions happen in person, but what happens between sessions matters for maintaining momentum and relationships. Online communication serves the in-person gatherings rather than replacing them.
Think about how friend groups use messaging. The messages are not the friendship - the friendship exists through spending time together. But messages between hangouts maintain connection, make planning easier, and let people share small things that strengthen relationships. Online communication for co-working sessions works the same way.
Before each session - A few days ahead, post in your group chat or message group. Remind people when and where the session happens. Ask who is planning to come. Mention what people might work on if they need ideas. This serves multiple purposes: it reminds busy people who might forget, seeing other people commit to attending makes others more likely to come, and people can prepare mentally for what they will work on.
After each session - The same day or the next day, share a brief summary. Maybe post a photo of people working (with their permission). Mention projects that made progress. Tag people who attended. Announce the next date. This creates social proof that real work happened, makes people who could not attend feel connected to the group, and reminds everyone that the next session is coming.
Between sessions - Keep online communication minimal and focused. Post when someone finishes a project, when people want to collaborate outside sessions, or when scheduling needs to change. Avoid the temptation to have all project discussions online.
Online connection should feel light and supportive rather than demanding. People should be able to ignore the online component for a week and still show up to sessions without feeling lost.
Measuring Success
How do you know if your co-working sessions are working?
Measuring attendance numbers is misleading - Twenty people attending once each is not success. Five people attending consistently is success.
Measuring project completions matters - How many people actually finished something they were working on? This could be finishing a website, completing a design, solving a problem, or reaching a specific milestone. When people complete projects, they feel their time investment was worthwhile. They keep coming. They tell others. Track completions over time as a measure of whether the sessions enable real progress.
Measuring relationships matters - Did new collaborations form? Do people talk to each other outside sessions? Do regulars help newcomers? These relationship measures indicate whether the community is developing depth beyond just sharing workspace.
The underlying principle is measuring quality of engagement rather than quantity of participation. A small group of people making consistent progress and supporting each other is more successful than a large group where people attend once, make no progress, and never return.
Common Problems and Responses
Every co-working session eventually faces challenges. Understanding common problems and effective responses helps hosts adapt without abandoning the model.
Only a few people come initially - This is completely normal and not a sign of failure. Three to five people is enough to start. Start small and scale is the best practice, at least for the blockchain community it is the best practice.
Newcomers arrive without a project to work on - Keep a list of "starter tasks" ready. These might be tutorials people can follow to build something simple, or existing projects where newcomers can contribute small pieces. Pairing new people with experienced participants helps them get started. The goal is helping them quickly get into "doing mode" rather than "wondering mode."
Talking disrupts people trying to focus - Some participants want to discuss their work extensively while others want quiet focus. Create a "discussion corner" where people can move if they want extended conversations. Gently remind people during work blocks: "Let's keep work time quiet so people can focus. We can discuss more during the break."
The same few people dominate sharing time - Use a timer if needed. Make clear that sharing is optional - people can say "pass" if they prefer. Some hosts go around the circle so everyone gets an equal opportunity. The goal is hearing from diverse voices.
Energy drops after several months - This is natural. Invite one or two new participants to add fresh energy. Or invite an expert for one session to provide outside perspective. Work is hard, people break after a project. They will be back for next project.
People stop attending regularly - Talk to participants. Sometimes life circumstances change and there is nothing to adjust. Sometimes you discover problems you can fix. This direct conversation provides better information than guessing why attendance dropped.
The key to handling problems is making small adjustments while preserving what makes co-working sessions work: regular schedule, balance of focus and connection, peer support, low barriers to participation. When problems arise, fix what is broken without changing things that are working.
Learning from Experience Across Contexts
This co-working session model comes from blockchain developer communities where it was refined over seven years. The specific technical work differs from community organizing or civic technology projects, but the underlying challenges are similar: isolation when working alone, difficulty maintaining momentum, need for peer support, struggle staying motivated over time.
We do not know yet whether this model works as well for community projects as it did for blockchain developers. That is why documenting your experience matters, whether your sessions succeed or struggle.
When you try this model, pay attention to:
What translated well from the original context - Which elements of the structure worked without modification? This helps identify the core principles that might apply across different types of projects.
What needed adaptation - Which parts did you change to fit your community's needs? How did you modify them and why? These adaptations help others understand how to tailor the model.
What did not work at all - Which elements failed completely? Understanding failures is as valuable as understanding successes because it prevents others from repeating the same mistakes.
What emerged that was not in the original model - Did you discover approaches that improved on the original pattern? New practices that emerged from your specific context might benefit others.
There are formal ways to share this learning. Organizations like the Civic Tech Field Guide collect examples of practices across different communities. We the Blueprint also collects the wins and fails, experiments of trying to do something in someway so other readers can learn together.
This article documents patterns from blockchain developer communities tested over seven years. The applicability to community organizing and civic technology contexts is still being established. We invite practitioners to test these patterns in their communities and share their experiences - both successes and failures - to help us all learn what works under different conditions. To share your case please refer to our contributor portal.
