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The Solution for Open Office Frustration

bbc.com

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Re: The Solution for Open Office Frustration

#11

Post by greenshackle2 »

Twirrim wrote: post #7

I've got an amazing idea. Go away from open plan offices. I'm really baffled that that wasn't one of the solutions in the article. Red and Green coloured cubes? Lights? Ugly attempts to mask the symptoms, rather than fix the real problem: Open plan offices suck for productivity.

That's what I was thinking, especially reading this line:

> With the vast majority of us now working in open concept offices — some studies have said that 70% of US workers work in this kind of environment — companies are being forced to come up with novel ways to ensure we stay productive and don’t find ourselves driven delirious from the noise and chaos.

They are being forced. Who chose the open office concept in the first place!?

Re: The Solution for Open Office Frustration

#13

Post by angusp »

greenshackle2 wrote: post #11
Twirrim wrote: post #7

I've got an amazing idea. Go away from open plan offices. I'm really baffled that that wasn't one of the solutions in the article. Red and Green coloured cubes? Lights? Ugly attempts to mask the symptoms, rather than fix the real problem: Open plan offices suck for productivity.

That's what I was thinking, especially reading this line: > With the vast majority of us now working in open concept offices — some studies have said that 70% of US workers work in this kind of environment — companies are being forced to come up with novel ways to ensure we stay productive and don’t find ourselves driven delirious from the noise and chaos. They are being forced . Who chose the open office concept in…

they're being 'forced' insofar as they're usually locked in to continuing to occupying their current office.

Re: The Solution for Open Office Frustration

#16

Post by bigiain »

zitterbewegung wrote: post #9

The solution for open plans offices is to give everyone a real office.

I think the pendulum still has a way to swing yet. Quite a few places I know of are touting their new "activity based working" arrangements - which is HR/PR/Marketing speak for "hot desking, because rent is too expensive to even give you all your own desk in an open plan office, so you get to share desks and fight over what's left whenever you run late".

Many of the people I know who I consider to be in the "10x developer/PM/designer" category start picking up all the recruiter calls as soon as that's announced. I _strongly_ suspect whoever got "implement ABW to reduce real estate costs" as one of their KPIs also snuck "reduce renumeration costs by organically cutting headcount" written into their end-of-year-bonus goals, while explicitly leaving out anything to do with productivity (or more likely, ensuring the "productivity" KPI got dropped onto a career-ladder-rival...)

Re: The Solution for Open Office Frustration

#17

Post by flukus »

angusp wrote: post #13
greenshackle2 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's what I was thinking, especially reading this line: > With the vast majority of us now working in open concept offices — some studies have said that 70% of US workers work in this kind of environment — companies are being forced to come up with novel ways to ensure we stay productive and don’t find ourselves driven delirious from the noise and chaos. They are being forced . Who chose the open office concept in…

they're being 'forced' insofar as they're usually locked in to continuing to occupying their current office.

Cubicle walls are cheap and you can keep the current office.

Re: The Solution for Open Office Frustration

#19

Post by flukus »

bigiain wrote: post #16
zitterbewegung wrote: post #9

The solution for open plans offices is to give everyone a real office.

I think the pendulum still has a way to swing yet. Quite a few places I know of are touting their new "activity based working" arrangements - which is HR/PR/Marketing speak for "hot desking, because rent is too expensive to even give you all your own desk in an open plan office, so you get to share desks and fight over what's left whenever you run late". Many of the people I know who I consider to be in the "10x deve…

I could see hot desking work for companies that are mostly work from home. For some reason (probably the ones you listed) it gets cargo culted by companies that don't allow remote work.

Re: The Solution for Open Office Frustration

#20

Post by Spooky23 »

drewg123 wrote: post #15

Some workers take to building their own symbolic barriers for privacy At Google. somebody went as far as to build a little hut around his cube using cardboard boxes that he'd glued together. I wish I had a picture..

When I started working for the government, there were alot of old timers who would acquire surplus cabinets other things to build mazes to their workspaces. It seemed to be a instinctual compulsion.

The ultimate was an angry desktop manager who came up with some security excuse to get a large open area in a basement. They wired up a security camera in the front, and when you got an audience to deal with him in person, you'd need to navigate a maze of palletized equipment (mostly surplus junk) to get to his office. While you did that, he'd slip out a back door.

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