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Ask HN: What are some tech companies that do not use an open floor plan?

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Re: Ask HN: What are some tech companies that do not use an open floor plan?

#331

Post by Diederich »

sanderjd wrote: post #320
Diederich wrote: post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apparently here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15725493 Certainly not a productive comment. A quick scan of that users's history seems to indicate fairly reasonable stuff: https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=xiphias&next=1582220... (among others) Given a lot of other reasonable posts, (apparently) one low value comment seems to be able to get a user shadowbanned. That strikes me as a bit excessive.

I see this from time to time and it frustrates me. I would love it if people above a karma threshold could vouch for shadowbanned users with a recent history of more constructive comments.

> vouch for shadowbanned users

I have vouched for perhaps hundreds of shadowbanned comments, is that what you mean? Or vouching for a user directly?

Re: Ask HN: What are some tech companies that do not use an open floor plan?

#332

Post by DanBC »

sanderjd wrote: post #320
Diederich wrote: post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apparently here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=15725493 Certainly not a productive comment. A quick scan of that users's history seems to indicate fairly reasonable stuff: https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=xiphias&next=1582220... (among others) Given a lot of other reasonable posts, (apparently) one low value comment seems to be able to get a user shadowbanned. That strikes me as a bit excessive.

I see this from time to time and it frustrates me. I would love it if people above a karma threshold could vouch for shadowbanned users with a recent history of more constructive comments.

If you click the timestamp of the comment there should be a [vouch] link.

If you've checked the comment history and the comments seem ok I guess you can email the mods to let them know.

Re: Ask HN: What are some tech companies that do not use an open floor plan?

#334

Post by geekbird »

aphextron wrote: post #135
hordeallergy wrote: post #94

It's not acceptable. I've moved from a dev background to having a go at sre/devops/something-or-other; work aside, the culture is excrutiating, with people shouting across the office all day. Best case, someone talking to themself hour after hour, as if anyone wants to hear that. The idea that open floor plans are productive is farce. I effectively have two jobs, the first being just trying to get any work done.

It's also extremely unhealthy. I've never been so sick in my entire life as since I started this job a year ago. Literally herded like cattle into an open air room with hundreds of other people from all around the world coughing and sneezing in your face all day. I'll never ever accept another position with this kind of setup.

The last open plan cesspit I worked in literally gave me pneumonia for the first time in my life. Too many contractors coming in sick, not washing their hands, coughing all over the office. It was long benches, with 36" allotted per person. A freaking hellscape where you literally touched your neighbor if you put your arm out to the side.

Re: Ask HN: What are some tech companies that do not use an open floor plan?

#335

Post by geekbird »

resalisbury wrote: post #325

This is partly driven by costs. Where rents per square foot are less, more companies have opted to have offices. Just like how in Mountain View some Googlers live in the parking lot. It's not cause they think parking lots are hip, space is expensive.

But the cost "savings", even in high rent areas like San Francisco, are eaten up by a significant loss of productivity.

In a high rent market like SF, a programmer's salary plus benefits and employer taxes (loaded labor) is about $200K. Open plans have an anywhere from 25% to 50% productivity hit from increased distractions and sick time (sorry, I can't look up the studies right now.) So while you might save $30K/year/dev going from offices to open plan in an expensive market, you will lose $50K/year/dev in productivity. Since those come from different budget buckets, and management never really sees the productivity hit, management thinks they've saved money and convinced people that open plan is "hip", "open" and "collaborative", when in reality most people are unproductive, stressed, unhappy and now despise their noisy, smelly and messy coworkers.

Re: Ask HN: What are some tech companies that do not use an open floor plan?

#336

Post by geekbird »

eli wrote: post #164
amelius wrote: post #77

Just find some plywood and build yourself a nice cubicle :)

Cubicles are far worse than open plan IMHO

Nope, IMSHO. I've worked in everything from a solo office to benching in an open plan.

Open plan anything makes me nostalgic for the smallest cubicle I ever had (4ft x 5ft). Give me walls, even if they are short.

Re: Ask HN: What are some tech companies that do not use an open floor plan?

#337

Post by geekbird »

baud147258 wrote: post #113

I'm currently working in a small open plan with 6 other people, but the company is moving in June and I'll be in the big open space with 40 people. At least it should only be developpers, so we won't have sales people shouting on the phone.

My condolences.

Re: Ask HN: What are some tech companies that do not use an open floor plan?

#338

Post by geekbird »

NoiseMan88 wrote: post #326
tintor wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Noise cancelling headphones will cancel low frequency sounds like fans / AC, but not high frequency ones like talking and phones.

Disturbances from noise in office environments fall into 3 main frequency bands: low (ventilation/Ac), mid (conversations) and high (some parts of ventilation noise, some noise from office equipment). The most disturbing frequency band (on cognitive tasks) is probably the middle frequency, especially when the noise has "information" (language, tones, signals); but on a physiological level (directly affecting health (…

Thank you for an occupational health viewpoint and the citation.

Do you have a good recommendation for a recording dB meter and recording app suitable for graphing noise levels over a daylong period? Such a thing would be useful in proving the noise load of a busy open office and allow it to be compared to OSHA standards.

Re: Ask HN: What are some tech companies that do not use an open floor plan?

#339

Post by wmli »

wskemper wrote: post #20

I work for Viasat; all of our new-build offices in the past few years have been designed around what we call the neighborhood concept. A neighborhood is a set of individual offices (maybe 60sqft-ish?) with three solid walls, and one glass/wood wall with a sliding door. All the offices open into a central room that can be outfitted in a bunch of different ways. There are neighborhoods of different sizes, and basically…

I found these pictures after some digging.. would you say they are representative?

http://sca-sd.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/2c-viasat-offic... http://sca-sd.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/12/2d-viasat-offic...

Architecture firm's site: http://sca-sd.com/portfolio/viasat-2/

Looks very spacious, not sure if it's feasible in high cost (/ sq ft) offices?

Re: Ask HN: What are some tech companies that do not use an open floor plan?

#340

Post by sanderjd »

Diederich wrote: post #331
sanderjd wrote: post #320

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I see this from time to time and it frustrates me. I would love it if people above a karma threshold could vouch for shadowbanned users with a recent history of more constructive comments.

> vouch for shadowbanned users I have vouched for perhaps hundreds of shadowbanned comments, is that what you mean? Or vouching for a user directly?

A user directly. I don't think vouching for the comments does anything because they're already shadowbanned. (I may be wrong.)
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