I think open-office is great. It makes it much easier for independent developers to compete with large corporations.
What???
The open-office trend is destroying the workplace (2014)
11–20 of 237 posts
Re: The open-office trend is destroying the workplace (2014)
#12>Now, about 70 percent of U.S. offices have no or low partitions, according to the International Facility Management Association.
I'd really like to see how they define "office"
Re: The open-office trend is destroying the workplace (2014)
#13It's good that people are finally talking about this. Like 7 years ago, people were commonly pretending that they liked it (or maybe they just didn't watch their productivity).
It's normal: you make such a big investment (moving to an open office), you have to pretend you didn't screw it up good. Like when people pretended they liked standing desks because they spent $1000 in one. Imagine standing still for eight hours a day.
Adjustable stand/sit desk with motor is a way to go. Has been common in Microsoft and Apple for years.
Re: The open-office trend is destroying the workplace (2014)
#14I suspect that google knows this, had made a calculation that the downsides are worth the real estate cost, and is spinning it in a more positive light.
Why pay $300k+ a year for a developer then just to go and save a few hundred a month on real estate costs, sacrificing some percentage of productivity?
Those numbers don't add up, but there are others that do: thousands a month for more space + less productivity loss after an initial shock period could be a potential equilibrium.
Re: The open-office trend is destroying the workplace (2014)
#15I suspect that google knows this, had made a calculation that the downsides are worth the real estate cost, and is spinning it in a more positive light.
Why pay $300k+ a year for a developer then just to go and save a few hundred a month on real estate costs, sacrificing some percentage of productivity?
Because not everyone in Google (or any other open-office space) is a developer. In fact, most are not, and most are getting way less pay.
Re: The open-office trend is destroying the workplace (2014)
#16It's good that people are finally talking about this. Like 7 years ago, people were commonly pretending that they liked it (or maybe they just didn't watch their productivity).
It's normal: you make such a big investment (moving to an open office), you have to pretend you didn't screw it up good. Like when people pretended they liked standing desks because they spent $1000 in one. Imagine standing still for eight hours a day.
> Imagine standing still for eight hours a day.
Imagine sitting perfectly still for eight hours a day.
I just imagined both, and I preferred the standing still nonsense to the sitting still nonsense.
Re: The open-office trend is destroying the workplace (2014)
#17I think open-office is great. It makes it much easier for independent developers to compete with large corporations.
I too think it's great*
*Owns shares in headphone company
Re: The open-office trend is destroying the workplace (2014)
#18It's good that people are finally talking about this. Like 7 years ago, people were commonly pretending that they liked it (or maybe they just didn't watch their productivity).
As I've learned after being a huge opponent of offices and then beijg forced to work in one: Terrible for individual productivity, great for group productivity.
Teams work better when everyone's in a room together. Alas.
Also, if you have problems with interruption: stop being macho and write some fucking notes while you work. Don't keep that shit in short term memory.
Re: The open-office trend is destroying the workplace (2014)
#19While the open-office debate has been a recurring meme on HN for some time, it seems that offering a variety of options as well as unfettered personal choice is key.
For example, my current employer has wide-open office space with pods of desks, but they also offer numerous privacy rooms for escape. As a mild to mid introvert myself, this allows for the best of both worlds the majority of the time: I can benefit from those casual, spontaneous conversations that pop up in the open space, but I can also grab my own room for an entire afternoon to crank out some heads-down work.
I think what's most important is for companies to acknowledge and respect the variety of working styles of their employees, along with the trust that--regardless of how chatting in a pod or hiding away from others might appear--more often than not they're getting shit done.
edit: words
Re: The open-office trend is destroying the workplace (2014)
#20Nothing says we don't value you like being lined up in rows with no walls. They might as well elevate the manager offices like guard towers to complete the look in that photo. Do these companies get payoffs from head phone manufactures?
And otologists lobby... I wonder how is people hearing out of years on headphones.