Is Facebook’s Massive Open Office Scaring Away Developers?

Post by caleblloyd » Mon, Oct 10, 2016, 9:35 PM UTC

cjmoran wrote: post #200

caleblloyd wrote: post #27

I worked for a year at IBM's RTP campus. Everyone had their own dimly lit cube with 5-foot walls, no natural daylight, and white noise playing over speakers to drown out conversation. The depressing undertone of the office was part of what pushed me to quit. My team at my present job works in an open setting with 8 people in the room and windows with natural daylight. It's quiet enough to focus but gives us the oppor…

Hah, that old server room on the second floor of 500? That place was incredibly depressing. I worked from home nearly every day (breaking the "two days per week maximum" policy) because I couldn't stand it in there and my team wasn't located in RTP anyway.

Post by gertef » Mon, Oct 10, 2016, 9:39 PM UTC

renaudg wrote: post #116

jsprogrammer wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Simple supply and demand analysis shows that goods command higher prices when supply is lower.

And indeed the supply of good engineers is low. If Facebook insists on hiring only them, then it makes sense that they're paying more on average.

Post by ashark » Mon, Oct 10, 2016, 9:45 PM UTC

Declanomous wrote: post #240

cylinder wrote: post #216

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Don't expect that in the US anytime soon as we haven't even mandated annual leave yet. I really think natural light should be required for all. I went to a high school in Texas literally modeled after a prison. No windows, no natural light anywhere in the entire building. Built in 1979. What is wrong with these people? I took my SATs at a high school classroom with a huge windows looking out to a forest setting... It…

I struggled with fatigue for most of my sophomore year of high school. I started falling asleep in class out of nowhere. Then, as suddenly as I started falling asleep in class, I stopped.Looking back, I realized that I had been going days and weeks without seeing the sun. None of my classes had windows, nor did the lunchroom or the gyms. I had been getting to school early for clubs and leaving late because of sports.…

Post by qohen » Mon, Oct 10, 2016, 9:50 PM UTC

mightykan wrote: post #123

United857 wrote: post #59

(Disclosure: FB employee) Most of the problems about overhearing conversations, etc, can be dealt with by a nice pair of headphones. Here, it's universally accepted as the 'do not disturb' signal.

This is absolutely not a solution if you have tinnitus or a hearing damage or both. Also this is an insane workaround. Think about what you’re suggesting: the environment that you’re working in, the place where you go to, intentionally, to focus and concentrate, is so filled with undesired and irrelevant noise, that in order to get your work done, you need to tune it out with headphones. How does that make sense? The…

Post by amyjess » Mon, Oct 10, 2016, 10:00 PM UTC

schiang wrote: post #34

caleblloyd wrote: post #27

I worked for a year at IBM's RTP campus. Everyone had their own dimly lit cube with 5-foot walls, no natural daylight, and white noise playing over speakers to drown out conversation. The depressing undertone of the office was part of what pushed me to quit. My team at my present job works in an open setting with 8 people in the room and windows with natural daylight. It's quiet enough to focus but gives us the oppor…

Team sized rooms are definitely the way to go. You can avoid conversation from other teams that you don't care about. When there is a conversation in the room, it's probably related to what you're doing so it's not necessarily distracting you. I worked in a room with just my team and it worked out great. We were able to have discussions and draw stuff on white boards on the wall without distracting anyone else. It al…