Meet The Members: Jonathan Dulson, Community Manager at Foundry

This Spring x+why will be venturing out of London and expanding into Birmingham. 6 Brindleyplace is being rebirthed as ‘Foundry’, with x+why taking three floors to meet a growing demand for sustainable and purposeful, flexible office spaces. Jonathan Dulson is the site’s community manager, and explains a little more about what makes this one of the most exciting and innovative spaces in the area.

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Tell us a little more about you and your role at x+why

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I’m the Community Manager at Foundry, my job is to make sure that our amazing members have everything they need, that any events taking place run smoothly, and to help create a great working atmosphere for everyone using the space.

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How did you start your journey in the industry?

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This is my first position in the industry as it goes, my background lies predominantly in Entertainment, Events, Performance and of course Customer Services. I have to say though, except for standing on stage performing, this is the closest job I have found that has that natural vibe for building relationships and creating amazing customer experiences.

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What is to come for Foundry?

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So much! Honestly, over the next couple of months we plan on introducing our members events programme slowly but surely, as well as several networking events for people to come along and experience what we are all about and hopefully learn a little bit a BCorp.

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What makes Birmingham such a great place to live and work?

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Birmingham is one of the most culturally diverse and inclusive cities in the UK.

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How is Diversity and Inclusion promoted in the space?

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We try to be always inclusive of everyone, honestly, the more variety the better. Going forward as we progress over the next few weeks, I’d love to introduce some diversity and inclusion events, themes etc, to open things up and let people tell their stories.

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What makes this space and area unique?

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We’re not only a flexible working space, we’re different, we offer a relaxed and inspiring workspace, full of greenery and positive vibes. It’s not JUST an office, we really are something far more, but you’ll have to drop in to truly experience it for yourselves.

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Tell us a little more about some of the faces behind the community?

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There is so many more people working behind the scenes, not just x+why, but also our partners in Brindleyplace, all of us are working together to try and create an amazing and sustainable community and culture for all businesses in Birmingham to take forward and change the world.

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Examples of internal and external collaboration?

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We have a great working relationship with Brindleyplace management and wouldn’t have been able to achieve what we have so far in terms of the building and our launch event had they not so keen to partner with us on this project and I am happy to say that they’re also members of our fabulous community.

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What’s to come on the events Calendar?

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We held our launch event on the 19th of May which seems to have been a great success, I certainly enjoyed it. Starting next week on May 26th we will have our first members event in the form of a Community Coffee morning, then from June we have a full schedule of in house and external events taking place.

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How are Foundry supporting wellbeing?

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We have partnered with a couple of different Birmingham based people who will be providing varying workshops on mental wellness, but on top of that, we will be offering in house spin bikes, Les Mills on Demand, yoga sessions and so much more to our members.

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What’s the best part about your job?

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Hard question to be honest, but the best bit must be getting to know and spend time with all of our amazing members and creating a community that everyone wants to be a part of.

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What do you love most about x+why?

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Again, this one isn’t easy, what’s not to love? For me though it has to be the focus that x+why as a company put on the mental wellbeing of their employees and members.

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How has what you do changed you as a person?

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It’s only been just over 4 weeks for me, but already I am looking at extra ways I can try and support my friends, family and other people with mental health and I’m trying to find new ways to become more sustainable in my everyday life, not just my work life.

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