Community Manager Awards 2025: Audrey McKnight

Audrey McKnight has a philosophy that guides everything she does: community first.

It's rooted in her personal involvement in a church community, where she learned the values of belonging, service, and family. At Venture X San Antonio Northwest, where she's been Community Manager for three years, she's carried those values forward into the workplace. She intentionally cultivates an environment where members "feel supported like family—welcomed, encouraged, and celebrated."

Why? Because she believes true growth happens when people know they are cared for.

And it's why she's a semi-finalist for Community Manager of the Year 2025, an award that will be presented at the Global Workspace Association conference in Chicago. Sponsored by Coworks for the third consecutive year and presented by CEO DeShawn Brown, the recognition celebrates the community managers who understand that coworking isn't really about the workspace at all.

And in San Antonio, Audrey has built something that goes far beyond the stereotypical desks and WiFi. She's built a home for innovation, connection, and growth—one relationship at a time.

When a member's world fell apart

There's a moment that defines Audrey's approach to community management. A moment that shows what happens when someone leads with their heart instead of a contract.

One of their members had a child who was diagnosed with leukemia. Suddenly, showing up at the coworking space became impossible. Working became impossible. The father was facing the worst crisis of his life, and on top of everything else, he had a lease commitment he couldn't fulfill.

Audrey didn't shrug and point to the terms of service. She didn't calculate what the space stood to lose and make a business decision.

She worked tirelessly to overhaul their current agreement. She downsized and adjusted the membership so his employees still could have an office. She abated many of their dues until the child was better.

And then she did something extra. She organized a toy drive for all the children in the cancer ward at the children's hospital at Christmas.

The story has a happy note: the child is in remission. The member was able to return to work. "They now have an even larger office and are growing rapidly," the nomination reads.

But imagine if Audrey had handled it differently. Imagine if she'd been rigid about the contract, unsympathetic to the circumstances, focused only on the bottom line. That member would be gone. That relationship would be destroyed. And the entire community would have learned something about what Venture X really valued.

Instead, they learned that when life gets hard, their community manager has their back. That Venture X is a place where people matter more than policies. That the "family" language isn't marketing lingo. It's how they actually operate.

This is what separates good community management from exceptional community management. The willingness to see past the transaction to the human being on the other side.

A foundation of hospitality

Audrey's background prepared her perfectly for this kind of leadership. She came from "hospitality in the hotel industry, working with family-owned hotels with small teams of 10-20 people."

Those small, family-owned operations taught her something corporate chains often miss: that hospitality is about making people feel at home, not just providing a service. That relationships matter more than efficiency. That when you treat guests like family, they become loyal in ways no marketing campaign can manufacture.

What drew her to the flexible office industry was simple: "Getting to know people and building relationships. Seeing members grow and thrive. Ability to see regulars every day and watch their transformation."

In hotels, guests come and go. You might see someone for a night, maybe a week. But in coworking, you get to witness the arc of someone's business journey. You watch the entrepreneur who starts nervous and uncertain grow into a confident CEO. You see the startup that begins as one person expand to a full team. You're there for the wins and the struggles, the pivots and the breakthroughs.

"Networking and meeting new people from different industries," Audrey says when asked about her favorite parts of community management. "Being in hospitality. Helping people and giving back. Being involved in people's growth."

That involvement isn't passive. Audrey doesn't just watch from the sidelines. She's actively connecting people, facilitating relationships, creating opportunities for members to help each other succeed.

The results that matter

Here's what makes Audrey unusual: she combines deep relational skills with serious operational excellence and marketing expertise.

She's "successfully launched and managed multiple marketing campaigns that significantly increased brand visibility and drove a strong pipeline of qualified leads for office, community members, meeting rooms, and event space." As a new franchisee, they still managed to "break out frequently in the monthly Venture X-wide KPI's in Meeting Room and Virtual Office categories."

She improved operational efficiency by optimizing their CRM system, "automating tasks such as collecting updated IDs when they expire and deploying personalized drip email sequences for office membership renewals." 

These efforts made day-to-day tasks more manageable for the team while ensuring "members feel well-informed, valued, and clearly guided through the renewal process." The innovations were so effective that they shared them with Corporate to distribute to fellow franchisees.

She proactively became more involved in digital marketing strategy, particularly Google Search Ads, "by dedicating time to certification training and continuous learning." This helped optimize ad performance, improve lead attribution, and drive higher-quality traffic to the site. Working with their marketing partners, she identified multiple issues and helped rectify them.

And perhaps most impressively, Audrey has "consistently been in the top 10 of our corporate Monthly Leader board in Leads by Location, Activity Leaderboard by rep, Deals Won, and Tour Leaderboard." Even more remarkably: "she has been on these boards every single month since we opened two years ago."

Every. Single. Month.

That's not luck. That's not occasional brilliance. That's sustained excellence over two years of consistent performance.

What makes the ideal community manager?

When Audrey describes the ideal community manager, she describes someone who "goes above and beyond" and "truly wants to be super involved." Someone who "helps people want to be in the space long-term" and "creates a collaborative atmosphere that makes people want to come to the office."

That last part is critical. In an era when remote work is easier than ever, getting people to actually show up requires more than just providing desks. You need to create an environment that's genuinely more valuable than working from home. You need community that feels real, not manufactured. You need relationships that matter.

Audrey creates that through constant connection. She's "constantly connecting people with the right contacts" and "introducing members who can help each other's businesses." She hosts multiple networking events monthly—member appreciation events, open networking events, professional development workshops. She's "always offering ways to meet new people and make meaningful connections."

Every initiative, from high-impact networking breakfasts to professional panels, is "designed to spark meaningful connections, create opportunities for collaboration, and add tangible value to members' businesses and lives."

She measures her achievements not in occupancy rates or revenue numbers, but in "the connections made and the opportunities created."

Engaging the community beyond the walls

What makes Audrey's approach particularly powerful is her understanding that a coworking space can't exist in isolation from its broader community.

She's cultivated partnerships with local businesses, nonprofits, universities, and networking groups. She's extended the Venture X community far beyond their walls. She's secured sponsors for large-scale events. She's mentored new entrepreneurs. She's supported member success stories in ways that ripple outward through San Antonio's business ecosystem.

When she hosts signature networking breakfasts for 100+ guests, she's not just filling a room. She's creating a node in the city's professional network. A place where connections happen that might change the trajectory of someone's business. A hub that makes San Antonio's entrepreneurial community stronger.

With nearly a decade of hospitality leadership and a Bachelor's in Business Administration, Audrey brings both the warmth of genuine care and the rigor of professional excellence. She's more than friendly. She's strategic. She's more than kind. She's effective.

This combination has "fueled record retention rates, consistent growth in memberships, and recognition of Venture X as a hub for collaboration in San Antonio."

The problem she couldn't ignore

Sometimes community management requires creative problem-solving that has nothing to do with relationships or marketing.

For Audrey, that moment came after a problematic construction project left them with serious HVAC issues. Members were uncomfortable. The space wasn't functioning properly. And the solution wasn't obvious.

So Audrey "brought in her father-in-law (an HVAC expert) to do a full assessment." She tapped her personal network to solve a professional problem, bringing in expertise that might have cost the space thousands of dollars.

It's the kind of resourcefulness that comes from genuinely caring about the member experience. When people are uncomfortable, you don't just submit a work order and hope for the best. You do whatever it takes to fix the problem, even if that means calling your father-in-law.

The birthday party that became a parable

There are moments in community management that you couldn't plan if you tried. Moments that reveal the unpredictable, delightful chaos of working with humans.

For Audrey, that moment came when a client wanted to throw her 60th birthday party at Venture X. She called it her "triple 20th." She spent $10,000 on the event.

But when it came time for the party, the client couldn't afford a photographer. So Audrey became the photographer.

The night ended with Audrey "rolling the drunk birthday girl in an office chair to her hotel."

It's absurd. It's hilarious. And it's also perfect. Because that's what happens when you treat members like family. You don't just manage their workspace. You end up photographing their birthday parties and wheeling them to their hotel when they've had too much champagne.

Would Audrey's job description include "birthday party photographer and wheelchair taxi service"? Absolutely not. But when someone needs help, family shows up. And Audrey always shows up.

What high expectations look like

Here's how Audrey's nominator sums up her impact: "Over the past year, she has intentionally sought to exceed my very high expectations; by leading with integrity, fostering a culture of collaboration, and consistently delivering results that reflect the core values of our community: service, excellence, and accountability."

That word matters. Audrey isn't accidentally great at her job. She's not coasting on natural talent or good fortune. She's intentionally seeking excellence. She's deliberately choosing to go above and beyond. She's consciously building a culture that reflects specific values.

"For me, being a community manager isn't about managing space," Audrey writes in her bio. "It's about creating belonging."

Creating it. Not facilitating it. Not enabling it. Creating it from scratch, through hundreds of small decisions and interactions and moments of care that accumulate into something bigger than any individual gesture.

The Texas standard

In Texas, things tend to be bigger. Ambitions, personalities, expectations. And at Venture X San Antonio Northwest, Audrey McKnight has built one of the most vibrant coworking communities in the state.

She's done it by refusing to separate her personal values from her professional life. By bringing the community-first philosophy she learned in her church into the workplace. By treating members like family not because it's good marketing, but because it's who she is.

She's done it through sustained operational excellence. Through showing up in the top 10 corporate leaderboards every single month for two years. Through optimizing systems and learning new skills and driving results that matter to the business.

And she's done it through unreasonable generosity. Through organizing toy drives for children in cancer wards. Through photographing birthday parties and rolling drunk clients to their hotels. Through bringing in her father-in-law to fix the HVAC. Through adjusting contracts when members face impossible circumstances.

When DeShawn Brown presents the Community Manager of the Year award in Chicago this October, whoever wins will represent a profession that's essential to the future of work. Community managers are the bridge between real estate and human connection, between business model and belonging, between space and community.

And in San Antonio, Audrey McKnight proves every day that the best community managers don't just build communities. They build families. They create homes. They make people feel like they belong to something bigger than themselves.

That's not in any job description. But it's exactly what the job requires.