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How I learned to stop worrying and love the cubicle

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Re: How I learned to stop worrying and love the cubicle

#41

Post by mhurron »

bobby_9x wrote: post #20
ArkyBeagle wrote: post #15

The emphasis on "face time" is just laziness. Laziness is, however, inevitable. I say that; I've done more good with a five minute hallway discussion ( in terms of heading off an "oh heck no" idea ) than any other technique. but the entire "we need to socialize in order to be successful" thing is sorta mind-numbing. The word that comes after "social" is "engineering."

Communication without face-to-face time is still difficult in many ways. A couple of years ago I worked remotely as a software developer. The boss would only give me tasks through email/JIRA and we would have standup meetings daily. Almost every time I was assigned a task, I would be given an extremely vague description. Now normally, this is what we need to deal with as developers, but I could barely get an idea of…

I wouldn't blame the communication medium for people clearly not being interested in communicating.

Re: How I learned to stop worrying and love the cubicle

#42

Post by cuddlybacon »

jamisteven wrote: post #26
kfk wrote: post #21

The thing is: who leaves at 5pm? It's 8:15pm and I am still here (OK, I work in an office, but still). I think working from home you can get free time simply being more productive. I know I would do that. At work, you have to be there, even just to wait that your boss is finished with task A, so that he can finalize task B with you. Then you have the commute, mine is 90 minutes per day. Bottom line: I don't have time…

"The thing is: who leaves at 5pm?" People with boundaries?

People who respect themselves.

Re: How I learned to stop worrying and love the cubicle

#43

Post by [deleted] »

kdamken wrote: post #33
kfk wrote: post #21

The thing is: who leaves at 5pm? It's 8:15pm and I am still here (OK, I work in an office, but still). I think working from home you can get free time simply being more productive. I know I would do that. At work, you have to be there, even just to wait that your boss is finished with task A, so that he can finalize task B with you. Then you have the commute, mine is 90 minutes per day. Bottom line: I don't have time…

Did you get in at noon? Why would you work somewhere that requires those kinds of hours? With a 90 minute commute on top of that? Not trying to be condescending, it's just that those kinds of things would be a huge motivator for me to find another job. I found a place 15 minutes from my house, and everyone in the office is gone by 5, sometimes earlier on Fridays. I hope you find a better job soon.

[deleted]

Re: How I learned to stop worrying and love the cubicle

#44

Post by sbuttgereit »

city41 wrote: post #19

I've worked at companies that had completely open spaces, individual offices for everyone, and cubicles. By far my favorite is cubicles. I hate open offices and will actively avoid them. They are noisy, distracting, stressful, and not conducive to productivity. They are conducive to collaboration though. Offices are stifling. They put too many barriers between talking to people, and I found everyone tended to rely on…

I have seen very workable open office spaces. The key seems to be room size. I consulted to Gateway Computer Company back in the 90's and I would work in their Poway, CA offices which were open office format. It actually wasn't bad there because the space was essentially a large warehouse with very high ceilings (more than a couple of storeys high as I recall). The nearby sound and noise wasn't directly reflected back and there were enough people that the general din was closer to a white noise.

In smaller spaces, however, I agree. Not good.

Re: How I learned to stop worrying and love the cubicle

#45

Post by sosborn »

cuddlybacon wrote: post #42
jamisteven wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"The thing is: who leaves at 5pm?" People with boundaries?

People who respect themselves.

That's not really fair. Some people enjoy working like that, some people find that the salary they are making (and enjoying) require those kind of hours, etc.

Re: How I learned to stop worrying and love the cubicle

#46

Post by douche »

bobby_9x wrote: post #20
ArkyBeagle wrote: post #15

The emphasis on "face time" is just laziness. Laziness is, however, inevitable. I say that; I've done more good with a five minute hallway discussion ( in terms of heading off an "oh heck no" idea ) than any other technique. but the entire "we need to socialize in order to be successful" thing is sorta mind-numbing. The word that comes after "social" is "engineering."

Communication without face-to-face time is still difficult in many ways. A couple of years ago I worked remotely as a software developer. The boss would only give me tasks through email/JIRA and we would have standup meetings daily. Almost every time I was assigned a task, I would be given an extremely vague description. Now normally, this is what we need to deal with as developers, but I could barely get an idea of…

I have found that people who are incoherent in text tend not to be any more coherent when they are flapping their gums, either.

Re: How I learned to stop worrying and love the cubicle

#47

Post by amyjess »

stronglikedan wrote: post #37
city41 wrote: post #19

I've worked at companies that had completely open spaces, individual offices for everyone, and cubicles. By far my favorite is cubicles. I hate open offices and will actively avoid them. They are noisy, distracting, stressful, and not conducive to productivity. They are conducive to collaboration though. Offices are stifling. They put too many barriers between talking to people, and I found everyone tended to rely on…

I like my office, and I don't feel that it adds any additional barriers over a cubicle, unless I want it to. I like initiating communication with chat or email, with the option of an impromptu face-to-face meeting if necessary, or the option of being able to defer that meeting when I need to focus. I keep my door open when I don't mind a visitor (like a cubicle), but I can close my door to indicate to people that I a…

The best setup I've ever had was where I shared an office with exactly one other person, and both our backs were to the wall.

We both had enough privacy without the isolating effects of having an entire office to ourselves.

Re: How I learned to stop worrying and love the cubicle

#48

Post by Grishnakh »

stronglikedan wrote: post #37
city41 wrote: post #19

I've worked at companies that had completely open spaces, individual offices for everyone, and cubicles. By far my favorite is cubicles. I hate open offices and will actively avoid them. They are noisy, distracting, stressful, and not conducive to productivity. They are conducive to collaboration though. Offices are stifling. They put too many barriers between talking to people, and I found everyone tended to rely on…

I like my office, and I don't feel that it adds any additional barriers over a cubicle, unless I want it to. I like initiating communication with chat or email, with the option of an impromptu face-to-face meeting if necessary, or the option of being able to defer that meeting when I need to focus. I keep my door open when I don't mind a visitor (like a cubicle), but I can close my door to indicate to people that I a…

>I didn't have that choice with a cubicle, because anyone could walk up at any time and cause me to shift that focus.

This isn't true of all cubicles. I used to work at a very large microprocessor manufacturer and before they "compressed" the cubicles, the cubicles were 9x9. Someone had to physically come into your cubicle to get your attention (or pop their head over the wall, but only 6-foot+ people could do that). To deal with disturbances, we actually had "DO NOT DISTURB" signs assigned to us which we could hang across the cubicle entrance to keep people from bothering us. These signs were frequently used, and to very good effect.

Personally, I wish I could go back to that environment. It was the best of both worlds when I had this nice-sized cube with privacy, but was also seated next to a coworker I frequently needed to collaborate with. It was great being able to pop my head over the wall when I needed to, but without worrying about being distracted or disturbed by other people for less-important stuff, and especially not by random passers-by the way I am in open environments.

Re: How I learned to stop worrying and love the cubicle

#49

Post by deagle50 »

deagle50 wrote: post #7

I work from home now but I'll take a cube over an "open" office every time.

Forgot to add, my only exception is when working on a team project it helps to be in the same room. Otherwise the open office is a surveillance scheme where everyone is watching everyone else.

Re: How I learned to stop worrying and love the cubicle

#50

Post by camelNotation »

kfk wrote: post #21

The thing is: who leaves at 5pm? It's 8:15pm and I am still here (OK, I work in an office, but still). I think working from home you can get free time simply being more productive. I know I would do that. At work, you have to be there, even just to wait that your boss is finished with task A, so that he can finalize task B with you. Then you have the commute, mine is 90 minutes per day. Bottom line: I don't have time…

I am always gone before or at 5. I am always here before 8. I am never late, I don't take lunch breaks, and I never stay late.

I've never had an employer complain about this. I've had some bosses who regularly work past 5, but they understand that I am in the office before they are each morning and that although I am flexible when big projects are due, there is a limit to what I will tolerate before I start looking for work elsewhere. I learned the hard way that you have to draw those lines yourself, otherwise someone will draw them for you.

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