The Geek Talk

Who is Alex Hillman?

I’m the co-founder of IndyHall and a social technology and community developer living in Sunny Philadelphia. I like technology, how people interact with it, and how it helps them interact with each other. I’m also consulting with one of the city’s best advertising firms, Red Tettemer, working to build and tune their interactive practices. I’m the CTO of a near decade old t-shirt company. I’m the business and product manager on a number of small commercial software and media side projects including Two Guys on Beer and Mailroom for the iPhone. I’m a public speaker and a writer. And along with Amy Hoy, I’m currently teaching a class yearofhustle of nearly 60 global students how to come up with an idea that’s a viable business and launch it.

In my free time (???) I love to travel, enjoy food and wine, and watch really bad movies.

About Indyhall?

IndyHall is a coworking community and space. What that means is we’ve spent the last 3 years nurturing a community in Philadelphia that is composed of people who can work from anywhere, but choose to work alongside other people. IndyHall, (it’s full name is Independents Hall) has over 140 members that include designers, developers, writers, artists, entrepreneurs, scientists, educators, small business owners, telecommuters, marketers, videographers, game developers, and more.

The office part of IndyHall is approximately 4500 square feet of open air workspace including desks, chairs, power, internet, lounge space, conference rooms, a full kitchen, 3 full bathrooms, and a totally rad vintage phone booth.

What does your typical day look like?

Most days I wake up and clear out overnight email, and put together my to-do list for the day. By 9:30 am I’m at Red Tettemer, where I work with the creative teams (including the interactive group), the account teams, the leadership team, and even some client facing work. Around 1:30 pm, I’m packing up my things to head to IndyHall to start the 2nd half of my day working for Choice Shirts and Pro World. That means checking in with any of the developers who are currently in build to make sure they have everything they need, or researching technology for a new initiative, or supporting the leadership team and their business needs with technology.

After work, I usually head out to grab drinks or dinner with friends, and then home to my apartment to take care of some reading or writing.

What do you do in your free time?

My friends are my world, so any time I can find is spent with them. I love Philly’s bar and restaurant scene, so if I’m not leaving the city, there’s a good chance you can find me at one of my favorite restaurants or bars.

I also love people watching. Despite having spent most of my life working with technology, I find people to be infinitely more interesting. Technology is predictable. People are weird and fascinating.

Current favorite apps?

Always on in my dock are Chrome, Tweetie, and Propane. I’m also totally dependent on Dropbox and Skitch, using them almost daily.

What OS do you prefer?

I grew up a Windows kid, but switched to Mac exclusively in 2006 and have never looked back. I run a 13″ Macbook Pro fully loaded, with Snow Leopard. And yes, I’ll have an iPad this Saturday.

Small picture for your Workplace?

Name something that has inspired you recently?

After having a chat with a couple of graduate students working on their industrial design thesis from IndyHall, I discovered this TED talk about Tribal Leadership.

What do you prefer (and why)? Freelance work or full time employment?

After 3+ years of freelance work, I’m working in sort of a hybrid employment situation where I’m in two long term, but part time contracts, as well as juggling all of my own projects and initiatives. I liked being completely freelance because it afforded me the ability to “binge and purge” in terms of workload. I could work 3-4 weeks at 70+ hours a week, and then take a few weeks off. I also thrive on the ability to decide what I work on, and with who, which makes freelance ideal.

Nowadays, my days and weeks are much more structured, but I do have a couple of incredible leaders that I work with so it’s really worth the compromise. The ONLY major downside to the workload I have now is I’m spending far lass time at IndyHall, but I’m working to remedy that.

I really can’t see any interest in full time employment for me in my future. I put my heart into everything I work on and if I’m not working on things I don’t believe in, I shut down. I don’t know of a company that would afford me that kind of freedom with full time employment.

I’ve considered full time employment a few times, and even interviewed just to see how it made me feel. At the end of the day, I’d consider it to be an experiment. I’m not sure what would happen first: would I quit, or would they fire me?

What are your personnel projects and goals for 2010?

I’m dedicated to complete the authoring and curation of a book on coworking, which you can find out more about at coworkingbook. I’m also doing everything in my power to make sure that my travel for work and travel for pleasure are at least even, if not in favor of pleasure.

My personal goal of 2010 is the same personal goal I have every year: to change the world around me just a little bit, for the better.