Where we are: Taylor Davidson on workspace

This is a guest post by Taylor Davidson (@tdavidson), photography contributor to Linchpin Magazine.

I first met Kenny at a coffee shop in Dublin, Ireland, a combination of an introduction through a good friend and fortuitous timing in our travels around the world. Based on our online communications, I had an inkling he was a kindred soul, a feeling that was confirmed almost instantly when we met. As we talked about goals, projects and ideas past and present, his excitement about the upcoming Linchpin Meetups and magazine was obvious, and although I wouldn’t be able to attend a meetup, I wanted to help, and I offered him use of my photographs that would fit the magazine.

“Workspaces” was an obvious choice. As much as we live and work online, it’s the offline, physical, personal world that makes the online world work. Where we work has an indelible impact on our lives. The physical environment is obvious: our office, cubicle or desk, our proximity to our ambient and intrusive surroundings, we can all look at the space and think: “oh, I can get work done here”. Or the alternative.

But what we don’t see: the impact of our relationships online and offline, the hierarchies, bureaucracies, rules, structures and expectations we face everyday. While the built environment grounds our body and fills our eye, it’s the world outside the built environment that guides our minds and fills our soul.

And that’s what Linchpins care about. The workspace, desk, office, phone, computer, website: these are the tools we use everyday so that we can have an impact beyond what we can see and touch, to impact people near and far, short-term and long-term, however we can.

That’s what Kenny cares about. That’s what I care about. And correct me if I’m wrong, but as Linchpins, that’s what you care about.