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More Americans are working remotely than ever before. With a little help from a new tourism startup, some of these digital nomads are waking up in private villas in Bali, snacking on fruits from the local market, and bathing in outdoor showers before starting the workday.
Unsettled, founded in 2016, curates 30-day co-working retreats around the world for entrepreneurs, freelancers, and people transitioning between careers. The company promises a productive work environment set in paradise, where participants can break from their routine, find new perspectives, and form authentic professional relationships.
We spoke with Michael Youngblood, a serial entrepreneur and cofounder of Unsettled, on why co-working travel experiences offer something that traditional co-working spaces can't.
A "co-working retreat" sounds like a vacation made by millennials for millennials — like the grown-up version of study abroad. But that's not the intention, Youngblood says.
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Unsettled was built on the belief that the best experiences are the ones you are a full participant in. "You have to collaborate, you have to create. You have to connect with people. You have to contribute," Youngblood says.
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He says these "Four C's"— which he co-opted from an old professor — help people become more fulfilled in all aspects of life, from spirituality to professional development.
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In 2013, Youngblood was living in Washington, DC, running his own creative agency. "My biggest and only client was MIT, so I was doing work for them. But I had never stepped foot on the campus before," Youngblood says. He started to feel isolated without an office to work in.
Around that time, he put feelers out through social media to see if any friends wanted to take an extended trip where they would work and adventure on the weekends in Bali, an Indonesian island known for its forested volcanic mountains, beaches, and coral reefs. He expected five or six friends to join in. Instead, 42 friends and friends of friends agreed to go.
It was an "ah ha" moment for Youngblood. "I wasn't making money off it, but at the same time, I was like, '$82,000 in revenue for an idea I came up with two weeks ago?'"
See the rest of the story at Business Insider