31–40 of 359 posts
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Where I live what he did is a fairly serious criminal offence.
It appears to be standard practice everywhere in corporate America.
The problem I am seeing is that many managers have NO idea how their employees actually work. If you take your average MacDonalds manager they can (mostly) work every station in the joint and then know how to do MORE things. Your average corporate middle manager has NO idea what their staff does or how.
To be quite honest, most of these middle managers are not only at a loss as to what they should be doing but are also dealing with the isolation far worse than "staff". I have come to realize that a lot of their time was spent on social aspects of the workplace and they have been removed.
I have one client who wants to snapshot staff at their computers, and another who is ready to cut middle management fat... we live in interesting times.
Two things: Productivity is going to plunge no matter what, with the possible exception of singles who don’t have roommates. There is no way that during an ad hoc and unorganized push to work remote (though necessary in this circumstance) can result in good productivity, monitoring or not. Under the best of circumstances it would take months for a mass of people to adjust and be productive. The apex for open office d…
I'm surprised cubicles get so much hate. I loved mine at my first job. Oodles of desk space. Locking drawers and cabinets. There was a chair in the corner so a guest could sit. Made it easy to have 2 meetings without disturbing people. less aesthetically pleasing in office photographs, but overall a much better work environment than any open plan I've experienced.
Two things: Productivity is going to plunge no matter what, with the possible exception of singles who don’t have roommates. There is no way that during an ad hoc and unorganized push to work remote (though necessary in this circumstance) can result in good productivity, monitoring or not. Under the best of circumstances it would take months for a mass of people to adjust and be productive. The apex for open office d…
Single person with no roommates, I can confirm that my mental health is slipping and it's really hard to maintain a positive attitude at work. Productivity will slip and employers just need to adjust their expectations.
Two things: Productivity is going to plunge no matter what, with the possible exception of singles who don’t have roommates. There is no way that during an ad hoc and unorganized push to work remote (though necessary in this circumstance) can result in good productivity, monitoring or not. Under the best of circumstances it would take months for a mass of people to adjust and be productive. The apex for open office d…
I think less than 5% of comments on open-office design, that I have ever seen, were positive. Who are the people you are describing as being “sold”?
It's basically taboo to say anything positive about open office spaces online. There are many, many legitimately terrible open office workspaces in the world. Suggesting that open offices aren't always bad feels like an attack on those who are miserable in their open office. So it's safer to just never bring it up.
In the real world, a lot of people do enjoy open office style environments. They're probably the same people who went to their University's library to study in college or joined a study group so they could sit with others who were working on the same topic. Many (not all, obvious) college students choose these open, social study environments organically during college. It's reasonable to expect that they'd carry their preferences into the working world.
I have a theory that the more someone prefers isolation and being alone, the more likely they are to participate in internet comment sections and online forums. As a result, the deeper you go into internet comment sections, the more unanimously people rail against open office floor plans.
In a perfect world, we'd have a mix of companies offering both working styles and people could choose their preferred style up front. Anecdotally, I worked for a company that advertised private offices as a perk, but nearly zero of our candidates seemed to care. People tend to choose whichever company pays the best, regardless of the working conditions. I can understand why companies choose to save money on open office floorplans.
In 2004, I worked for a startup and we had beer in the fridge. We'd have an occasional afternoon where we would grab them. No big deal.
Most startups I worked at embraced a similar attitude.
Finally I worked for a company that went a step further and had beer on tap, but had rules, no beer until 5p M-Th, and 4p Friday.
It was foreign to me, but understood that in other divisions, the types of employees (like inside sales) were essentially entry-level roles.
Many of us in industry are used to flex hours, and the ability to remotely (including WFH), that we forget that for many others, it's novel. Seeing "asses in chairs" was a proxy for diagnosing productivity deficiencies, and bosses thrust into this new paradigm of working haven't necessarily picked up the skill sets to effectively manage remote teams.
Two things: Productivity is going to plunge no matter what, with the possible exception of singles who don’t have roommates. There is no way that during an ad hoc and unorganized push to work remote (though necessary in this circumstance) can result in good productivity, monitoring or not. Under the best of circumstances it would take months for a mass of people to adjust and be productive. The apex for open office d…
I think less than 5% of comments on open-office design, that I have ever seen, were positive. Who are the people you are describing as being “sold”?
At that point employees may not like it but it would make clear that they need to put money where their mouth is and demand a separate cube etc at work as part of job offer. Not getting it would be like so many other compromises that we make in life and has to be endured.