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Ask HN: Which companies give programmers offices?

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Re: Ask HN: Which companies give programmers offices?

#81
We mostly have 2 people/office. We would have done individual offices but the office space we found to rent was perfect except the offices were larger and so it was a LOT cheaper to use the existing build-out.

It is working well. People mostly are heads down getting their work done. So add Windward Studios to the list where all developers get offices.

Re: Ask HN: Which companies give programmers offices?

#82
post #71

That's why programmers should work remotely. It's the best thing I've ever done for my career. Moved back from Management to IC because it was remote and it's been amazing.

Remote work is great for so many reasons. Off the top of my head: For the company: * less office space expense * bigger talent pool * low cost benefit * increased documentation * encourages the trend towards outcome based management (as opposed to butts in seats) For the programmer: * more control over their work environment * more control over their time * no "commuting" subsidy for their employers * arbitrage paysc…

The problem with remote work is that you need very competent managers who understand the work deeply and can keep things together. From my experience there are not too many managers who can lead a remote team competently.

Re: Ask HN: Which companies give programmers offices?

#83
post #10

Most people programming in National Labs get offices, though you might need to share with one person. If you are in the bay area, think about SLAC or LBNL.

Depends on where in SLAC you're working. If you're in the IT building, you'll frequently need to share a larger room with 3-5 other people.

Re: Ask HN: Which companies give programmers offices?

#84

Old Microsoft: it was a BillG ethic: anyone touching software got an office: software design engineers, PM's, QA, even admins ... it allowed one to be quiet and focus. And signaled to co-workers - do not disturb ...

Most new buildings at Microsoft now have open office plans.

This is mostly due to employee demand (although some employees are very angry about it).

Re: Ask HN: Which companies give programmers offices?

#85
I have a small private office that I just lease myself. I bicycle in every day and work "remote" for IBM. It's fantastic.

If I want some noise, I'll work from home (I have a 3-year old.)

The down side is that IBM's management has recently done a 180 on remote working and is now "strongly encouraging" me to move to one of their offices and work in a cubicle.

I'm pretty sure they won't actually fire me for not moving, but any promotion is probably going to be harder to come by until things (hopefully) swing back in the other direction.

Or I'll just retire. The benefit of living in Ohio is that I can save like 40% of my salary and still live comfortably. (And lease an office for $225/month!)

Re: Ask HN: Which companies give programmers offices?

#86
2 years back We used to get a cabin office @Qualcomm for all Engineers same as VPs. Now Staff Engineers and above still get cabin office and others have moved to cubicles. We have a lab where most of us sit in the afternoon to collaborate. I must say this is the only place where I saw in my career where a fresh grad got cabin offices. It feels great to code in isolation uninterrupted. It also feels great to collaborate in lab with other folks and also code there.

Re: Ask HN: Which companies give programmers offices?

#87

I have a small private office that I just lease myself. I bicycle in every day and work "remote" for IBM. It's fantastic. If I want some noise, I'll work from home (I have a 3-year old.) The down side is that IBM's management has recently done a 180 on remote working and is now "strongly encouraging" me to move to one of their offices and work in a cubicle. I'm pretty sure they won't actually fire me for not moving,…

> Remote, IBM

Did this not affect your role: http://www.nbcnews.com/business/business-news/ibm-tells-its-...

Re: Ask HN: Which companies give programmers offices?

#88
post #71

That's why programmers should work remotely. It's the best thing I've ever done for my career. Moved back from Management to IC because it was remote and it's been amazing.

Remote work is great for so many reasons. Off the top of my head: For the company: * less office space expense * bigger talent pool * low cost benefit * increased documentation * encourages the trend towards outcome based management (as opposed to butts in seats) For the programmer: * more control over their work environment * more control over their time * no "commuting" subsidy for their employers * arbitrage paysc…

The downside for me is communication has more overhead and friction. Communicating in person is less effort. YMMV.

Re: Ask HN: Which companies give programmers offices?

#89
post #71

That's why programmers should work remotely. It's the best thing I've ever done for my career. Moved back from Management to IC because it was remote and it's been amazing.

Remote work is great for so many reasons. Off the top of my head: For the company: * less office space expense * bigger talent pool * low cost benefit * increased documentation * encourages the trend towards outcome based management (as opposed to butts in seats) For the programmer: * more control over their work environment * more control over their time * no "commuting" subsidy for their employers * arbitrage paysc…

I'd list working vacations as a downside. Proper time off, and the expectation that when you are on vacation you are on vacation is really important.

I work 1-2 days a week from home and it's a great balance. It gives me time to really get stuck into things with minimal distraction, and be more flexible with time. That said, the days in the office are really useful too - nothing beats sitting with other people physically when you need to communicate.

Re: Ask HN: Which companies give programmers offices?

#90

Stack Overflow does. I'm an engineer there and we still think providing private offices to our engineering team is important for their productivity. This includes engineers, SREs, designers, data scientists, PMs, and others. However, most of our engineering team is remote and if they're not in one of our locations, we give them pretty much what they'd like to build their own home office or go to a coworking space. Fo…

I'm still occasionally sad that I bombed an interview at SO a while back. I had prepped for more of a front-end/full stack JS role, and got asked a series of low-level data structure questions. I thought I did alright given the circumstances (I did work out the correct answer to each one), but the interviewer wasn't impressed.

I asked for a do-over and they said no. Oh well...

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