Working it up the Workshop17 ladder - a Landiso Kilani story
Landiso Kilani is the Workshop17 OG.
Authentic, respected and well-loved, Landi as he’s fondly known, has earned this title with just over a decade of Workshop17’ing under his belt. Landi is Workshop17 Watersheds Community Coordinator, but it hasn’t always been that way.
Roll back 10 years and you’ll find, he wasn’t the confident outgoing person he is today. Born in Cape Town, with time spent in the Eastern Cape, Landi reflects that he never really learnt to speak English fluently - English lessons in Grade 11 and 12 were mostly in Xhosa. So when he heard about a position opening at Workshop17 from his mother’s boss, he was a little apprehensive - but not enough to stop him from applying. He got the job, as a runner, on a trial basis while Workshop17 Watershed was being built.
When Landi landed the job, there was no furniture, no floor, no cafe, no glass box and no event space, just the two floors at innovation point, one that worked as a hotdesking space for two companies and the other functioned as the event space.
After a successful trial, Landi found himself with the permanent position of Mr Fix-it, he did everything, everywhere all at once - working mostly on the event side, setting up, making sure the clients were happy, but he also doubled up as furniture offloaded, assembler and setting up of the new spaces.
But Landi was shy, not his normal disposition, but a result of not being able to speak English fluently - He spent a lot of time hiding from people. There were a number of factors, he adds, that pulled him out of his shell and propelled him on the amazing trajectory he is on today. Acknowledging Laura, his boss (2016) who constantly checked in and chatted to him, the international meetings where you had to report back on your week, and of course the English courses that he was offered and took. Spending more time with Laura and the members pushed him to speak and interact with people, all contributing to boosting his confidence and improving his English.
As Watershed grew, so did the teams, and Landi moved into the eventing side of the business, becoming the leader of the event logistics and coordination. He shares “I felt so comfortable, I’d mastered the coffee station and set up and even enjoyed working with the clients, I could do it in my sleep” He was ready for the next step and ever curious, asked Laura to show him how to do the running orders for the events. Slowly familiarising himself with the computer, closely assisted by Laura who showed him the ins and outs of google, forms, and everything needed to get started on the running orders. Landi was on his way to typing and collating the info for the teams to fulfill.
And then COVID hit and sadly a number of staff were retrenched. With few staff members left and eventing being a COVID no-go, Landi offered his hosting services in the glass box. Conquering his fear of answering the phone, and chatting to members, he was slowly trained up in the role of host - shown the ropes of opening duties, tags out, walkthroughs of space, and learning the vast differences between eventing and coworking along the way. Then Laura offered him the official role of Host.
He admits he was really scared, and was given a week to think about it - In that week Laura pushed him to do and accomplish more than he’d had done before. Motivated by Laura's belief and encouragement he took the role.
During his time as host, Laura kept pushing Landi to excel - He didn’t know what the hosting role entailed as he was learning on the job, so when Laura gave him work to do, he thought it was all part of the job, little did he know that she had bigger things in store for him.
Landi laughs as he recalls the moment Laura revealed that he was doing more than the average host. She also shared the new job opening of Community Coordinator, and added, if you're interested, you can apply for it. Which he did, he’s been working as Workshop17 Watershed’s Community Coordinator for the last 10 months.
Landi is candid about his journey and everything he has learnt along the way. He shares that Workshop17 has opened his mind and allowed him to think differently. He loves coming to work, it makes him happy to be surrounded by people that care. He’s also learnt new traditions and has adopted birthday celebrations of cake and singing into his own life at home (something he only discovered at Workshop17)
There’s a whole other layer to Landi, a loving and caring single parent to his beloved son, brother and guardian to two studying sisters, a son and a passionate advocate for restoring dignity to primary school going children in the townships. Having experienced the shame of having no shoes nor a uniform to go to school while suffering the humiliation of taunts from fellow pupils, Landi is on a mission to ensure all children have the dignity of shoes. And we’re committed to helping him on this journey.
