open offices can work if people kept quiet and minded their own business.
also listened to their own headphones and not a common radio (as that one same playlist can drive someone crazy)
The open-plan office is a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad idea
151–160 of 461 posts
Re: The open-plan office is a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad idea
#152To throw some more anecdotes in with the rest of the comments, I love open offices. I've had my own office and found it lonely and boring. I never got less work done than at that job. Everything took longer because I had to stand up and walk to talk to my team. Instant messaging sort of worked, but if they didn't respond immediately, you didn't know if it was because they missed the message or they weren't actually i…
"And, as with anything, there’s a small subset of workers who legitimately DO enjoy the open office. But unless your company consists solely of such people (very unlikely), it’s hardly worth pleasing a few people to inflect a torment of interruption on the rest." -- @DHH
Re: The open-plan office is a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad idea
#153My biggest issue with my open floor office is that it seems like everyone just takes calls at their seats. We have private spaces and enclaves for that, but I am just bombarded with 4 people within 10 feet of my workspace on their phone. To counteract I throw on some Ambient music on my headphones, which sort of works but I still find I prefer to work in silence. Does it not seem like open-office etiquette to take a…
ask for some Zenbooths and create rule that calls must be taken in them. It makes the open office workable. www.zenbooth.net (I'm a founder there)
From one of the testimonials on that site: "I have some people who will literally spend all day in them."
Re: The open-plan office is a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad idea
#154The author completely misses the point using straw man argumentation. The managers sign the leases not because the of nice-looking photos, "increased collaboration" and other ridiculous arguments, but because of the bottom line. Open-plan offices are cheaper and that's the sole reason. Whatever other reasons are communicated to employees they're just typical corporate internal PR. I haven't actually met anyone who re…
Do you have evidence that open plan spaces are actually cheaper, even just in plain real estate terms? I’ve always read that they end up being less than a few percent cheaper per person after all is said and done. To boot, a lot of companies spend millions on stupid, opulent office features like fountains, coffee stations, roof decks, beer, etc. How do you explain that they are willing to spend so much more on that s…
I guess we come from different backgrounds. Personally, I've never met a person who liked the idea of open-plan offices - and this includes all managers. Of course they choose the best places for themselves to keep the maximum level of privacy possible.
As for the CEO - I can't imagine he could say "we're going to squeeze you all against your will to improve the bottom line." He had to say the usual bs, whether he believed it or not.
As for concrete data, check any online calculator. This one [1] shows individual offices as taking 3 times as much space as open-plan offices. As personnel costs are usually one of the highest fixed costs, going open plan might be a good alternative to lowering the salary when a manager wants to improve the bottom line - or, sometimes, to save the employees in troublesome times.
[1] http://officeprinciples.com/planning/space-calculator/result...
Re: The open-plan office is a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad idea
#155> And for what? Because a minority of people kinda like that configuration? Because it’ll look good in a few photos? Because it’ll impress strangers who visit the office? Somehow the author missed the primary reason for the open office configuration: "Because it cuts the costs of office space by a HUGE amount (certainly more than half)." I suppose "Because it makes it easier for managers to keep an eye on their emplo…
Yeah this is one of HN's favorite topics to bash on while completely ignoring the primary reason why the open office exists and persists. It's not about collaboration, it's not about socializing, it's about money. Just like all other business related decisions.
Every time the topic comes up on HN half a dozen people insist that the only possible reason anyone could ever consider an open plan office is cost.
Meanwhile, there's a thriving and growing industry selling desks in trendy open plan offices to self-employed people who for the most part could do their work in the privacy of their own home if they didn't think the atmosphere of an open plan office was worth paying for.
Re: The open-plan office is a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad idea
#156Earlier quoted context omitted.
What is "grab-ass all over the office"? I tried to google it to find whether it is expression, but got tons of porn as result.
Ah, sorry, it's a bit of local expression from where I grew up. People would say "grab-ass" when people are running/playing around and yelling like children at the office. It's not too uncommon for startups to have Nerf guns or something.
I've worked in offices where wrestling was not uncommon.
Re: The open-plan office is a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad idea
#157Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah and what kills me is how ubiquitous tellocomms are for multi-site corps. I can't tell you how many meetings I've been in where everyone was at their desk, headphones on and each was playing the mute/unmute game in order to not blast everyone else on the meeting with the surrounding noise. Then, given all that, you get the coworker two seats down Slacking you. If you're Slacking folks within 10 seconds walking di…
I agree. But I like slack more than talking because I get time to think and a transcript after. Probably yet another reason I love working from my home office.
plus with CYA, Tim can't deny being told about the remogolio project direction change if you can screenshot the slack message you sent to him at 14:28.
Re: The open-plan office is a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad idea
#158To throw some more anecdotes in with the rest of the comments, I love open offices. I've had my own office and found it lonely and boring. I never got less work done than at that job. Everything took longer because I had to stand up and walk to talk to my team. Instant messaging sort of worked, but if they didn't respond immediately, you didn't know if it was because they missed the message or they weren't actually i…
Thanks for sharing this! I am a IC and I love open offices. Also agree that privat offices feel lonely and are a hassle. I think like with many things there is just a vocal minority that bitching about open offices...we need more people speak up about all the benefits of open offices (besides the economic ones for the company that get cynically cited every time).
Same here ... it's ideal for me, though I can definitely agree that even better is the "hybrid" concept mentioned by a few others, where I have some time spent amongst the team, and some time spent in isolation.
Re: The open-plan office is a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad idea
#159Earlier quoted context omitted.
Yeah this is one of HN's favorite topics to bash on while completely ignoring the primary reason why the open office exists and persists. It's not about collaboration, it's not about socializing, it's about money. Just like all other business related decisions.
Every time the topic comes up on HN half a dozen people insist that the only possible reason anyone could ever consider an open plan office is cost. Meanwhile, there's a thriving and growing industry selling desks in trendy open plan offices to self-employed people who for the most part could do their work in the privacy of their own home if they didn't think the atmosphere of an open plan office was worth paying for…
Working at home has other issues (distractions, lack of separation between home/work, loneliness) so I can see someone wanting to rent a desk especially if they find working at home that particular day challenging to their productivity.
Re: The open-plan office is a terrible, horrible, no good, very bad idea
#160Earlier quoted context omitted.
It seems they also don't realize that people are watching a LIVE event, which is completely different than watching a movie. I've worked places where we would watch live streams of rocket launches (back when launches were less routine than they are now).
It is not unreasonable to ask people to move to an area where people aren't trying to work, even if the event is live. Many people do not care about ball and would like to work, and typically an office is the place where you are supposed to do that. Having the game on in the common work area is incredibly distracting with people cheering. Many people who are trying to work do not care if the event is live. Even as so…
This is the better approach. Make arrangements for people to watch while not disturbing the rest.