Why Five Days in the Office Is Too Many
nytimes.com
Why Five Days in the Office Is Too Many
1–10 of 71 posts
Re: Why Five Days in the Office Is Too Many
#2In contrast, I am energized by going into the office and working side by side with my peers to solve hard problems.
I dislike programming by myself, it is dull, boring, and much more error prone than when I have someone to bounce ideas off of. (Rubber Ducking only goes so far!)
Really every time this topic is brought up the overall consensus seems to be "it varies for different people." Some people seem to really benefit from working at home, some benefit from working in an office.
The real thing that gets to me is those who, for whatever reason, do not seem to understand that different people have different needs!
Re: Why Five Days in the Office Is Too Many
#3Not relevant to the subject, but I was just wondering if anyone can enlighten me on the use of is/are. Why is the headline Why five days in the office >is and not >are too many?
Re: Why Five Days in the Office Is Too Many
#4In contrast, I am energized by going into the office and working side by side with my peers to solve hard problems. I dislike programming by myself, it is dull, boring, and much more error prone than when I have someone to bounce ideas off of. (Rubber Ducking only goes so far!) Really every time this topic is brought up the overall consensus seems to be "it varies for different people." Some people seem to really ben…
Yep!
There are times I want to be in the office. There are times I want to be at a coffee shop. There are times I want to be at home.
As an executive, I feel like it's my job to provide as much flexibility to my team as I possibly can. Inspiration can strike anywhere, in any environment. I want to capture that for my business. I find that people really appreciate it as well.
Really it comes down to meeting management. Limit the requirement for face-time and structure the company in a way that you can minimize how often people have to collaborate. I find this makes the voluntary (and spontaneous) interactions even more valuable.
The Yahoo decision really bothers me in a really visceral way. My team is made up of highly skilled professionals who deserve to be treated like adults. Forcing them into the office is the opposite of that (at least to me).
Re: Why Five Days in the Office Is Too Many
#5Not relevant to the subject, but I was just wondering if anyone can enlighten me on the use of is/are. Why is the headline Why five days in the office >is and not >are too many?
The collection as a whole is the thing that is being compared.
400 computers are on the desk.
200 students are better than you. (everyone one of those students are individually better than you.)
200 students is better than none. (the total number is being compared as a singular item to the quantity 0)
Re: Why Five Days in the Office Is Too Many
#6In contrast, I am energized by going into the office and working side by side with my peers to solve hard problems. I dislike programming by myself, it is dull, boring, and much more error prone than when I have someone to bounce ideas off of. (Rubber Ducking only goes so far!) Really every time this topic is brought up the overall consensus seems to be "it varies for different people." Some people seem to really ben…
"In contrast, I am energized by going into the office and working side by side with my peers to solve hard problems."
Let me know if you still feel that way in 20 years.
Re: Why Five Days in the Office Is Too Many
#7Not relevant to the subject, but I was just wondering if anyone can enlighten me on the use of is/are. Why is the headline Why five days in the office >is and not >are too many?
It's a difference in convention between American and British English. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison_of_American_and_Brit...
Re: Why Five Days in the Office Is Too Many
#8I would have even looser guidelines, but still suggest some facetime in the office if possible. Mostly the team themselves should be able to mandate their own locations and hours to fit their needs. If they are productive...
Some teams may prefer heavy pair programming and thus may need to be most of time in the same location. Others(most) would use some sort of hybrid where the 5 hours 3 days a week probably works well. And then some will be very much independent tasks where then locations are mostly irrelevant apart from whenever syncing is needed and general communications with other teams and stakeholders.
But teams and even when pairing you do not always need to be permanently physically in the same location if they know each other well and can communicate freely across chat and screen sharing etc. However mostly in person will trump all communications.
Re: Why Five Days in the Office Is Too Many
#9Not relevant to the subject, but I was just wondering if anyone can enlighten me on the use of is/are. Why is the headline Why five days in the office >is and not >are too many?
The collection as a whole is the thing that is being compared. 400 computers are on the desk. 200 students are better than you. (everyone one of those students are individually better than you.) 200 students is better than none. (the total number is being compared as a singular item to the quantity 0)
I'm not an expert on this, but I have a different take. I think that "is" happens when there is an implicit gerund before the plural noun.
- [Working] five days in the office is too much (I do think that the title should be "too much", not "too many")
- [Having] two hundred students is better than [having] none.
That is, there is an implicit subject, and it is not the plural noun, which is actually a direct object.
Re: Why Five Days in the Office Is Too Many
#10Not relevant to the subject, but I was just wondering if anyone can enlighten me on the use of is/are. Why is the headline Why five days in the office >is and not >are too many?
The collection as a whole is the thing that is being compared. 400 computers are on the desk. 200 students are better than you. (everyone one of those students are individually better than you.) 200 students is better than none. (the total number is being compared as a singular item to the quantity 0)
Would "200 students are better than none" be invalid? When you swap out the number with some other word i.e. "Some students is better than none", using "are" is the correct choice.