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One day offices will be a thing of the past

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Re: One day offices will be a thing of the past

#21

Post by dugmartin »

jbattle wrote: post #11
c1u wrote: post #3

Yep, partially due to technology but I also think in 30 years almost everyone will be a freelancer and "jobs" as we know them today will be very very rare.

I can't imagine the pain of having to assemble a team of freelancers every three-nine months for the next iteration on some product/project. Unless the freelancers are utterly interchangeable, which is a pretty awful vision (people think they are cogs now?). When you want to organize a team you'd spend 25% of your time just assembling a team. The freelancers themselves would also spend tons of time waiting for a team…

That sounds exactly like a movie production. I'm sure they have figured out how to bring teams back together for sequels.

Re: One day offices will be a thing of the past

#23

Post by tomp »

diego wrote: post #8

In general, predicting that something that has been around for centuries will be gone in decades is a bad bet. I wonder if Richard Branson has ever spent long periods of time working alone. I spent six months working remotely in 2004. What led me to start my company in 2005 was not the desire to make money; I had enough back then. I really missed the in-person interaction with other hackers. I was living in Buenos Ai…

Exactly: you were not forced to work in the office. You chose it. Exactly what Brandon is saying.

Re: One day offices will be a thing of the past

#24

Post by talmand »

csallen wrote: post #16
diego wrote: post #8

In general, predicting that something that has been around for centuries will be gone in decades is a bad bet. I wonder if Richard Branson has ever spent long periods of time working alone. I spent six months working remotely in 2004. What led me to start my company in 2005 was not the desire to make money; I had enough back then. I really missed the in-person interaction with other hackers. I was living in Buenos Ai…

Hypothetically speaking, in a society in which "offices were a thing of the past", a problem so common as loneliness would likely be solved in a multitude of ways. Perhaps by changes in social conventions (e.g. friends working from each other's places) or by entrepreneurs directly attacking the problem (e.g. more coffee shops with fast internet, better tools for being social from home, etc).

That's the same argument that is often heard against home-schooling, the lack of socialization with other kids. What such people tend to not realize, or ignore, is that there are opportunities for kids to get socialization other than through school. True, it requires some effort on the parent's part but that doesn't mean they are not there.

If you work remote then there are avenues for socialization outside of an office space. Just because you find it lacking in one area doesn't mean that's the same for everyone nor should you ignore the possible advantages.

Re: One day offices will be a thing of the past

#25

Post by bradleyland »

diego wrote: post #8

In general, predicting that something that has been around for centuries will be gone in decades is a bad bet. I wonder if Richard Branson has ever spent long periods of time working alone. I spent six months working remotely in 2004. What led me to start my company in 2005 was not the desire to make money; I had enough back then. I really missed the in-person interaction with other hackers. I was living in Buenos Ai…

Who says everyone will dislike working remotely? I haven't worked in an office since 2005. I'm in Florida, my primary office is in the Cleveland (Ohio) area, and we have developers in New York and Toronto. I love it.

Re: One day offices will be a thing of the past

#26

Post by lazyjones »

I've read a lot about telecommuting here on HN lately. While I do this myself, I'm hoping that one day infrastucture and cost of living near the workplace will be at a point where everyone can just walk to the office (in 5-10 minutes). This is the best of all possible worlds for me: healthier, allows working from home and still dropping in at work for meetings or lunch or whatever comes up and no getting stuck in rush hour traffic (not in the car and neither in the subway/tram), no dangerous biking (in the city).

Also, Mr. Branson does not look too comfortable in his outdoor chair next to the street. ;-)

Re: One day offices will be a thing of the past

#27

Post by larrys »

eli_gottlieb wrote: post #10

Offices? Probably not. Entire floors and buildings without any purpose other than holding offices and cubicles? Yes, they were a fairly recent invention and will probably be gone soon. Remote work may be somewhat inefficient now, but when our technologies get good enough to build a room for consistent telepresence, there will be little point in having a cubicle across town when you can own a customized office and vir…

"Yes, they were a fairly recent invention and will probably be gone soon."

What do you mean by "recent"? They have existed for perhaps more than 100 years and before that there wasn't the type of work where they were needed and so they didn't exist. (There was no paper to be pushed? Or phones to be answered?).

"build a room for consistent telepresence"

There is much nuance you can pick up when someone is right in front of you vs. by telepresence. I'm not saying you aren't right or that what you say won't happen but don't discount the value of face to face at least in business, negotiation and management.

It takes much more work from me to buy something face to face (because I have to act and hide visual cues) then it does by email. But on the same hand I can pick up visual cues in the seller and make split second decisions based on them. It all depends on the situation of course.

Re: One day offices will be a thing of the past

#28

Post by binxbolling »

Apparently I'm an anomaly, but I like going to the office. Currently my company's offices are utter shit, but I'm still not opposed to the concept in general... and I still come in despite the less-than-inspiring setup we have at the moment.

I think what's crucial here, however, is that I don't extrapolate my "I prefer to work in an office" sentiment to everyone, like Bloomberg does. Furthermore, I'm lucky in that I have a choice in this and my bosses are constantly encouraging me to work from home more.

So I think if there's one thing it's better to predict, it's that employee choice will be much more of the norm, not that offices themselves will be history.

Re: One day offices will be a thing of the past

#30

Post by talmand »

dsr_ wrote: post #6
c1u wrote: post #3

Yep, partially due to technology but I also think in 30 years almost everyone will be a freelancer and "jobs" as we know them today will be very very rare.

Firms exist to reduce transaction costs. In order to freelance everything, you'll need to bring the costs way, way down -- and that includes learning what you're working on and figuring out how to cooperate with other people much faster than we've ever seen that happen. I suspect this is not ever going to match the efficiency of a good team with history.

Unless something happens to cause the cost of having full-time employees to rise higher than can be sustained. Examples can be government intervention in terms of taxes, wage controls, or mandates such as benefits.

In the US, that could mean a number of 1099 employees instead of the normal W2. Possibly long-term contracts would become the norm. Much of this would be the employer pushing the cost of employment onto the employee.

Also, I'd imagine that there are several examples where having a good team with a history is not much of a consideration. If you have access to enough people in the field in your area that have experience, it most likely would not be difficult to ramp up a good team that can suit your needs quickly. Professionals tend to be professionals.

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