Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

The Open-Office Trap

newyorker.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 123 posts

Re: The Open-Office Trap

#41

Post by sdepablos »

dpark wrote: post #19
Joeri wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Separate offices for at most 3 or 4 people who need to cooperate closely, with doors that close. Using glass walls you can get the same spacious feeling as an open office without the noise.

Glass walls don't provide any feeling of privacy, which is one of the complaints employees typically have about open floor plans. If shared offices are used, I think they should have opaque walls and everyone should be able to position themselves such that they have a wall at their back. This leads to a feeling of privacy. And it actually encourages discussion among those sharing an office, as opposed to the more typ…

What is so important about privacy? You're supposed to be working, aren't you? I can totally understand privacy when you're dealing with sensitive date that shouldn't be seen by other people.

Re: The Open-Office Trap

#42

Post by pavel_lishin »

bane wrote: post #17

I've written here quite a bit about my basic hatred for open offices. My personal opinion is that open offices are masked in lots of terms about "information flow" and "collaboration" when the reality is that it's about companies being cheap. I also went to a high school built originally on a completely open plan. At some point they realized teachers shouting over each other didn't work, or the teacher next door givi…

> I've even seen spaces with rows of inside sales guys on phones cold calling two desks over from very frustrated developers.

We have that. If there wasn't a short dividing wall between us, I could kick one of our sales directors in the shin. There's four more in that particular section.

Sometimes it's noisy and annoying, but at least I can put on headphones, turn on music and/or white noise, and ignore them - they don't even have that luxury most of the time, if they're on a call with a client. Devs being noisy? They have to deal with it. Their neighbor on another loud call? They have to deal with it.

It can suck for everyone, but at least we have more options for dealing with it.

Re: The Open-Office Trap

#43

Post by owenmarshall »

Domenic_S wrote: post #35
owenmarshall wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Also I've seen this tried and inevitably rules have to be put in place because no one wants to sit in the big room and everyone wants to sit in the cubes to do work. So you get people arguing about who's work is important enough to require the cubes. Which is not terribly motivating to people demoted to working sullenly, silently, in the big room. Bingo. The next time you see an open floor plan office, look at the '…

> Dollars to doughnuts the most senior person that doesn't have an office has claimed it as their personal domain. Haha, I remember reading when you said this before and laughing at my cube because that is exactly what happens. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6776833

It's the universal truth of open floor plans. I still remember trying to decide if I wanted to annoy the owner, tech lead, or lead designer when it came time to kick one of them out of the conference rooms so some developers could get on a conference call.

That's what is so funny about this whole discussion on open floor plans: it comes up over and over again even though scientific evidence overwhelmingly shows they are bad, employee satisfaction is shockingly low with them... but we can't seem to kick the habit!

Re: The Open-Office Trap

#44

Post by PythonicAlpha »

bane wrote: post #17

I've written here quite a bit about my basic hatred for open offices. My personal opinion is that open offices are masked in lots of terms about "information flow" and "collaboration" when the reality is that it's about companies being cheap. I also went to a high school built originally on a completely open plan. At some point they realized teachers shouting over each other didn't work, or the teacher next door givi…

Why do 1-3 people offices inhibit communication? I can't see it.

You can also have a central or conference room for communications, or coffee corners connecting the offices.

I think, Joel Spolsky has shown a real good example: http://www.joelonsoftware.com/articles/BionicOffice.html

His office does give both: Everybody can retreat, but also a huge area to communicate, live and exchange in community.

Re: The Open-Office Trap

#45

Post by ArkyBeagle »

Cubes are not cheap. Price them some time. The last time I saw figures, the were considerably more expensive than offices made of sheetrock and steel 2X4s plus modest desks.

They do increase potential density of employees.

Re: The Open-Office Trap

#46

Post by bqe »

dpark wrote: post #32
lgieron wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can play white noise on the headphones. It mutes other sounds without drawing attention to itself.

True, but this doesn't fix the comfort factor. It also doesn't change that headphones are just a bandaid for the core issues which are excessive distraction and ambient noise.

I think the culture of the office matters, too. If there's a culture, of, "Hey people are working here let's not be loud." and "She has her headphones in so let's not bother her." then it won't be too distracting or have too much noise.

Conversely, if an office with a closed office plan has a culture where closed doors are common and it's rude to knock, then collaboration will definitely be hindered.

We need to collaborate and to work in peace and quiet. This is probably why it oscillates between open and closed office plans. Neither solution is perfect. The best solution is probably default closed offices with a culture of having your door open and lots of collaborating spaces that are actually used.

Re: The Open-Office Trap

#47

Post by VLM »

owenmarshall wrote: post #29
VLM wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Lack of psychological territoriality. Still unhappy, but better. Oh if only I had a job where my boss thought I was important enough that I could have a picture of my kids in my cube, you know, a Real job. Also I've seen this tried and inevitably rules have to be put in place because no one wants to sit in the big room and everyone wants to sit in the cubes to do work. So you get people arguing about who's work is im…

>Also I've seen this tried and inevitably rules have to be put in place because no one wants to sit in the big room and everyone wants to sit in the cubes to do work. So you get people arguing about who's work is important enough to require the cubes. Which is not terribly motivating to people demoted to working sullenly, silently, in the big room. Bingo. The next time you see an open floor plan office, look at the '…

Work at home / coffee shop / park is a pretty cheap option. Give the boss an enormous office big enough to hold the whole team at some discomfort, but its only used for team meetings or the occasional (rare) large team effort. Head down grinding is done at home or somewhere else.

Also sub-team meetings often happen at a coffee shop. Three dudes at starbucks not the whole dept or whatever.

I've also seen people working at the public library, although its difficult because so many parent use it as a day care center drop off site. Aside from the homeless shelter antics.

Re: The Open-Office Trap

#48

Post by coldcode »

bluedino wrote: post #39
dpark wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cubes still suck. They have most of the same noise issues as open floor plans. Assholes on speakerphone conference calls... Also your plan requires that everyone work primarily on laptops (unless you expect to lug your desktop and monitors to a cube when you need to concentrate). And you've basically allocated double the space (cubes for half the team plus a room big enough for the whole team). Why not just cut the s…

>> Also your plan requires that everyone work primarily on laptops That's not a bad idea either way. Then you take your computer home if you want to work from home, or after hours.

Assuming you have a working VPN. We have one from a long dead company that barely works on PCs and for Macs we had to hack a solution ourselves.

Re: The Open-Office Trap

#49

Post by Florin_Andrei »

bane wrote: post #17

I've written here quite a bit about my basic hatred for open offices. My personal opinion is that open offices are masked in lots of terms about "information flow" and "collaboration" when the reality is that it's about companies being cheap. I also went to a high school built originally on a completely open plan. At some point they realized teachers shouting over each other didn't work, or the teacher next door givi…

I've always wondered what would happen if I told management "you guys made us work in a Dickensian sweatshop floor plan? Okay, how about I bring my own cubicle from home, and install it around my place here? I'm pretty good with DIY projects, you guys don't have to spend anything, I'll just fix the problem on my own. I'll paint it in the corporate colors and all, don't you worry."

Re: The Open-Office Trap

#50

Post by VLM »

ArkyBeagle wrote: post #45

Cubes are not cheap. Price them some time. The last time I saw figures, the were considerably more expensive than offices made of sheetrock and steel 2X4s plus modest desks. They do increase potential density of employees.

This would imply you could make floor to chest height walls of sheetrock and studs even cheaper than cubes. I'm not seeing it.

There is a long term savings in that reorgs of cubes means a couple hours for a couple guys with screwdrivers instead of week or so of carpenters / electricians / painters.

Post reply on HN