“Today we moved into our new Facebook building” • Hacker News Board

Re: “Today we moved into our new Facebook building”

#271

Post by eyeareque » Tue, Mar 31, 2015, 4:29 AM UTC

fsk wrote: post #108

moe wrote: post #81

a single room that fits thousands of people. What a nightmare. These "glass palace" offices may work for bankers or marketing teams. For programmers you could just as well plant their desks into the middle of a mall.

The offensive part is the people who say that open offices are MORE EFFICIENT than a traditional office. I have a hard time believing that one. Given how high programmer salaries are, the productivity loss due to open offices is almost definitely more than the office space savings. It seems like an introvert/extrovert thing. The introverts would prefer a quiet working space (and they're usually the best workers), but…

It is more efficient because you can tell when people are at their desk or not, which adds accountability, maybe?

Re: “Today we moved into our new Facebook building”

#272

Post by MaulingMonkey » Tue, Mar 31, 2015, 4:31 AM UTC

JohnBooty wrote: post #254

correctbattery wrote: post #241

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are seriously underestimating hoe awesome it is to code in bed under blankets on a cold winter day with a cup of hot chocolate beside you.

That would kill my back! But heck yeah to everything else, and add some pets curled up at my feet. I got so much extra work done this winter when it snowed and I worked from home.

I mounted an LCD above my bed so I can lay flat - no back pains. With a wireless mouse & keyboard on the lap I can touch type on.

...razor straight elbows aren't good either though, which eventually puts a crimp in that pose. Good for short runs of coding though!

Re: “Today we moved into our new Facebook building”

#273

Post by notatoad » Tue, Mar 31, 2015, 4:33 AM UTC

zaroth wrote: post #203

pkaye wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you design for 100 story buildings, you can design for a few story building with dirt on top.

It's fixing the leaks in 20 years that's the problem. But I guess the building just has to outlast the company...

Nah, we've gotten pretty good at sealing concrete. You put enough tar and landscaping fabric under there, it'll last a while.

Re: “Today we moved into our new Facebook building”

#274

Post by avn2109 » Tue, Mar 31, 2015, 4:34 AM UTC

abalone wrote: post #240

choppaface wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I've worked in an exclusively open format office and it can be hard at times. Ideally you can find 2-3 spots to work: your desk near your team, a reliably (tho perhaps non-reservable) quiet spot for focusing, and an (perhaps unreliable) quiet spot for super privacy (e.g. a conference room ). The most damaging part of the open format (for me) is that extroverted ops folk would fight fires all day and make tons of nois…

I like your 3-spot system, but JohnBooty is actually describing a 3-spot system too. He's just saying he wants to spend the majority of his time in the "quiet focus" spot rather than the "team collaboration" spot. That's really the issue here: what should your default zone be? I like your suggestion that the default location for your desk should be in the collaborative spot. Cornell studied this a few years back and…

>> "...what should your default zone be?"

My default zone should be a team office with a transparent door that shuts (preferably a big, heavy door, so people are subconsciously incentived to only bother opening it if they really need something).

The three-zone scheme sounds nice, but if you give me team offices and conference rooms of various sizes, I'm pretty sure we'll be unstoppable.

NB. I had this exact team-office+heavy clear door setup in my old office and it was awesome. When we moved to the new expensive space, it was just one loud big room, ugh.

Re: “Today we moved into our new Facebook building”

#275

Post by JohnBooty » Tue, Mar 31, 2015, 4:35 AM UTC

sytelus wrote: post #264

JohnBooty wrote: post #160

I would literally switch jobs (and perhaps careers, if every company was like this) if forced to work in an open office like this. I cannot work that way; I can't focus. I realize that I'm adding nothing constructive to this thread; I don't care. Maybe some manager somewhere will see this and a hundred other anecdotal opinions and think twice about open offices. I am the opposite of a prima donna. I just want to work…

Having spent almost equal amount of time in open office and private office, my own anecdote is that productivity wasn't dramatically better with private offices. In open offices, I just used to put head phones on, listen to non-vocal music and be super focused for many hours. In fact that was much better than private office because others would see you wearing headphone and they don't want to bother you. In private o…

   > When people see their teams working hard around them, they 
   > have little excuse not to follow the suit. 
   > In private offices... ...most people are actually fairly 
   > weak against distractions generated from their own computer

I think this is true. When left totally to my own with medium-term or long-term deadlines it's hard to resist the pull of distractions on the web.

But that is also fairly easily mitigated with methodologies like Scrum where you are frequently touching base with other team members. During the daily standup meetings you publicly commit to what you're going to do in the next day, and inform the team of what you did during the previous day (along with any roadblocks you hit, if any).

I don't find myself tempted to YouTube the day away when I know I've told the team I'm going to to X, Y, and Z today and that I'm going to have to stand up in front of them again tomorrow and let them know my progress (or lack thereof!)

  > In private offices, you mostly rely on bumping in to someone 
  > in the lobby for serendipitous discussions.

Collaboration is crucial! If private offices are so private that collaboration is discouraged, then that's a problem that needs to be solved somehow.

  > A 3 person team packed in to a private office is likely the best 
  > of both worlds.

I think I find this to be the worst of all worlds, hahaha. A conversation can be easier to ignore in a wide-open space (where it's part of the overall din) but there's no such aural camouflage in a 3-person office: it's just you, your work, and a noisy-ass conversation in close proximity.

Re: “Today we moved into our new Facebook building”

#276

Post by MaulingMonkey » Tue, Mar 31, 2015, 4:36 AM UTC

staticfish wrote: post #248

bbarn wrote: post #239

My least and most favorite topic rears it's head again. The open floor plan. Here's what I've come to think is about perfect: The open floor plan, with +-3 hour start/end time to your 8 hour work day (from say, 8:30-5), with optional hour lunch (paid or unpaid depending on policy/culture). Think about it.. there are definitely collaboration benefits to be had with the open floorplan. The contrast to that is always th…

Why should people that would like some quiet time (which is needed for all of us) have to come in at non-standard hours. That sucks. I think the bigger issue is how we've all been duped into how the open-plan offices "work" from MBA dicks.

> Why should people that would like some quiet time (which is needed for all of us) have to come in at non-standard hours. That sucks.

Dodging rush hour is a plus for me.

Re: “Today we moved into our new Facebook building”

#277

Post by eyeareque » Tue, Mar 31, 2015, 4:37 AM UTC

pbreit wrote: post #148

some1else wrote: post #8

Here's an article with a bunch of sizzling Instagram shots from people who got to take the first look: http://www.popularmechanics.com/culture/web/news/a14830/face... I'm really impressed by how non-gimmicky this Gehry building looks on the outside, and it seems like they really did a good job designing whatever space isn't consumed by the open plan.

One thing I like (and is so obvious) is to use the roof. It's insane how much wasted space exists on building/office rooftops.

I would run there every single day if I worked there.

Re: “Today we moved into our new Facebook building”

#278

Post by mc32 » Tue, Mar 31, 2015, 4:47 AM UTC

JohnBooty wrote: post #160

I would literally switch jobs (and perhaps careers, if every company was like this) if forced to work in an open office like this. I cannot work that way; I can't focus. I realize that I'm adding nothing constructive to this thread; I don't care. Maybe some manager somewhere will see this and a hundred other anecdotal opinions and think twice about open offices. I am the opposite of a prima donna. I just want to work…

What I see happen at these places too is that while in a hushed voice, people tend to gossip _a lot_ throughout the day. And the gossip has to be interspersed with citation, because a plain old chewing the fat without any authority is a waste of time, of course. And walk their dogs by...

But I guess it doesn't matter much when money is aplenty.

The other subtle thing is that you are being stripped of any privacy --we all get lumped together. Stripped naked of your individual humanity and sent into a human pen to do your work in a commune. It's great for some people, but one has to realize what is being taken away in the name of the unassailable communication and collaboration (and who in their right minds would want to go against that grain).

Re: “Today we moved into our new Facebook building”

#279

Post by lightblade » Tue, Mar 31, 2015, 4:51 AM UTC

sytelus wrote: post #264

JohnBooty wrote: post #160

I would literally switch jobs (and perhaps careers, if every company was like this) if forced to work in an open office like this. I cannot work that way; I can't focus. I realize that I'm adding nothing constructive to this thread; I don't care. Maybe some manager somewhere will see this and a hundred other anecdotal opinions and think twice about open offices. I am the opposite of a prima donna. I just want to work…

Having spent almost equal amount of time in open office and private office, my own anecdote is that productivity wasn't dramatically better with private offices. In open offices, I just used to put head phones on, listen to non-vocal music and be super focused for many hours. In fact that was much better than private office because others would see you wearing headphone and they don't want to bother you. In private o…

What? Of course private office is better. In an open office, I always have to worry about if my fart is too loud for the person next to me to hear. It's like every time I have to pass gas, it interrupts my train of thought so I get to let out a silent one. Or even better, some times I have headphones on, and totally forgot that I'm in an open office.

In a private office, I wouldn't have to worry about this.

Re: “Today we moved into our new Facebook building”

#280

Post by 27182818284 » Tue, Mar 31, 2015, 4:54 AM UTC

correctbattery wrote: post #211

correctbattery wrote: post #210

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I hear you. I work at Facebook, albeit in Seattle. Honestly, I'd prefer private offices too. I prefer complete silence for coding. (Okay, occasionally jazz, classical, or video game music.) I don't get that with our open plan office. BUT! 1) I can work from home as often as I want 2) we get free, very high quality headphones, and 3) there are quiet spaces I can use when necessary. Coming from Microsoft, I miss privat…

One reason I rent a two bedroom apartment is so that I can have an office at home.

A two bedroom in Nebraska runs you $500 per month. Timezone is off by 2 hours. Internet is 30 down 5 up for $60 per month.

There is a reason why companies like http://www.hudl.com/ are killing it here. You can fight for years, or have a ranch with basement when you're a 26-year-old developer.