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

Open offices are bad for us

bbc.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

171–180 of 377 posts

Re: Open offices are bad for us

#171

Post by christophilus »

majewsky wrote: post #126
BjoernKW wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Working remotely is one solution, but many companies don't think it would work for them. My prediction is those companies will go out of business eventually. Working remotely not only is more healthy in every possible way, it's also much more environmentally friendly. It's a key solution to a whole lot of societal problems in industrialised countries, not the least of which is traffic and all the negative side effe…

> Working remotely not only is more healthy in every possible way, it's also much more environmentally friendly. You sure about that first part? Everyone working at their home office sounds like the next step of neoliberalism-induced isolation, with its horrible effects on mental health: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/oct/12/neolib...

I commented elsewhere, but I've been working remotely for 2 years and have never been happier in my entire career, even though it's nowhere near the most interesting job I've had.

I have yet to miss the office. My dev team has a 1 hr meeting each week just to hang out and talk shop, things learned, discuss ideas, etc. And there are impromptu Slack/Skype session throughout the week, as needed. That has been more than enough for me.

But if it wasn't, there are lots of mitigations if I need them: I can go to a coffee shop, meetups, hop on Skype calls with the team, etc.

I'd much rather the impetus be on me to stay mentally healthy than be on some HR person who doesn't have a clue about what introverts really need in a work environment.

Not to mention... no commute... I'm out walking my dog or cooking with my wife while most of the world is stuck sitting in traffic.

Re: Open offices are bad for us

#172

Post by mhsabbagh »

garrettdimon wrote: post #149

A lot of the comments here seem to focus on socialization and feeling like you're in a community, but closed offices don't preclude this. I work at Wildbit (the company referenced in the article), and we have family-style lunches around a big table and plenty of common areas where socialization happens in the mornings, during lunch, when people make coffee, and plenty of other times. The key is that when folks are wo…

Too bad it takes a lot of logic to understand such thing.

Re: Open offices are bad for us

#173

Post by Joeri »

smelendez wrote: post #21

Open offices are awful, but they're here to stay for the same reason more adults are living with roommates and relatives: high real estate prices. Working remotely is one solution, but many companies don't think it would work for them. Personally, I'd make the shared area for solitary work only: no work discussions longer than a minute at work areas (use a conference room, take a walk or Slack), no eating at work are…

We have this shared area for solitary work at our office. All developers sit in a "quiet zone". It doesn't work. When you have 10 people in a room, you will get interruptions, even with the best of intentions.

Re: Open offices are bad for us

#174

Post by ThrustVectoring »

ionised wrote: post #164
pmcollins wrote: post #119

You could just wear ear muffs and mostly solve the noisy office problem. I wear them when I'm not listening to music and have improved my productivity and happiness at work. (And this is at a cubicle office which is still quite noisy.) http://www.3m.com/3M/en_US/company-us/all-3m-products/~/3M-P...

You also have visual distractions in an open office. I've just had at least a dozen people walk past my line of sight in the last minute and and it's distracting as hell for me.

It's not just visual. You're often seated at a desk that's physically connected to another person's. I've been annoyingly distracted by the person across from me pulling on the desk to move their chair around, shaking my keyboard and monitors.

Re: Open offices are bad for us

#175

Post by bambax »

I hate open offices with a passion, for reasons well explained in the article (and many others that regularly pop up here).

However, many companies that have open offices enjoyed an incredible success and some even achieved world domination (Facebook). How is that even possible is what I'd really like to know.

Re: Open offices are bad for us

#176

Post by BjoernKW »

majewsky wrote: post #126
BjoernKW wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Working remotely is one solution, but many companies don't think it would work for them. My prediction is those companies will go out of business eventually. Working remotely not only is more healthy in every possible way, it's also much more environmentally friendly. It's a key solution to a whole lot of societal problems in industrialised countries, not the least of which is traffic and all the negative side effe…

> Working remotely not only is more healthy in every possible way, it's also much more environmentally friendly. You sure about that first part? Everyone working at their home office sounds like the next step of neoliberalism-induced isolation, with its horrible effects on mental health: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/oct/12/neolib...

People had social lives before there was large-scale use of offices. There are several ways in which a home office allows for a richer social life:

- You're not stuck on your commute for several hours a day. That time can be spent much more beneficially, for example for having social interactions.

- Working remotely actually requires you to communicate more and better than when everyone's sitting in the same office.

- Remote work has the potential to do away with the "contiguous 8 hours, preferably from 9 to 5" notion of work.

If you don't have to sit around in an office all day in order to pretend you're "working" anymore only the results count not the hours that went into those results. So, pervasive remote work could lead to a general reduction in working time but at the very least it allows you to do other things throughout the day (and get back to work later).

I'm not saying that all of this will happen but working remotely has the potential to shake up preconceived notions of what work should be like.

Re: Open offices are bad for us

#177

Post by cmdrfred »

notahacker wrote: post #116
quanticle wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No offense, but I would suggest that you are highly atypical as a programmer. The vast majority of programmers (including myself) that I've spoken with prefer quiet, static backgrounds. Now, that's not to say that you need your own office to provide a quiet, static background, but it's just a whole lot easier that way. I interviewed last year at a very "tech-bro" type office in downtown Seattle. It was exactly as you…

> No offense, but I would suggest that you are highly atypical as a programmer. This is probably true, but whenever this subject comes up on HN people tend to forget that programmers tend to be fairly atypical people. Many people - mostly not programmers - find that a number of people around them with a shared purpose and even background noise actually helps them concentrate, and find casual conversations with people…

Two questions.

> the only reason anyone would choose to work in an open plan environment is cost-efficiency is rather dented by the number of self-employed people paying (and commuting) to work in shared office space

Does anyone have numbers for this. I doubt the majority of work from home employees use such a service.

>more peace and quiet staying at home.

Is this also true? Homes with children are rather loud places for example.

Re: Open offices are bad for us

#178

Post by mikestew »

dx034 wrote: post #53
Raphmedia wrote: post #19

Diseases and sickness are the worst part of open offices. One day one person gets sick. The second day the person to his left also gets sick. The day after, half of the open office is sick. After a week, the entire office is sick. You can almost track the migration of the disease across the room.

That's why good managers will tell their employee to go home when they're ill. There are companies that have strict policies for that, to avoid exactly this problem. Even though it's a problem that probably mostly affects flexible working space. If you don't share your desk with anyone else, you should usually be >3ft away from other people, lowering the risk for contagion.

That's why good managers will tell their employee to go home when they're ill.

And that's why the employee under the "all time off comes from one bucket" PTO plan will say, "that's okay, boss, I feel fine" so that they can save their time off for that trip to Europe.

Re: Open offices are bad for us

#179

Post by eropple »

jonas21 wrote: post #136
a1a wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's one of the main takeaways from the story tho. In an open office those who need silence cannot get it, even if there are private rooms available: "Some of us even feel that escaping to a quiet room is a sign of weakness" and "it can feel as if we’re not pulling our weight if we’re not present"

Over ear headphones are a pretty good workaround if you don't want to be distracted by the noise.

They're really not, though. In addition to "hey, hearing damage!" if you're listening loud enough to actually counteract the din of crap around you, it's a profoundly isolating thing to be wearing them for six hours a day. It's symptomatic relief that pushes the buttons of way worse problems, IMO.

Re: Open offices are bad for us

#180

Post by cableshaft »

Maro wrote: post #98

I've been working in open office environments for the last 5+ years, also at one of AmaFaceGooSoft. I find it's a non-issue, it doesn't bother me or others, I can't recall a time in the last 1-2 years when someone complained about it. Saying that o.o. is not effective is a bit fishy given how successful some of the companies employing it are. I remember 10+ years ago at my first job we had a nice office building (it…

> I can't recall a time in the last 1-2 years when someone complained about it.

I personally wouldn't complain about it, just quietly endure it until I find something better (I have done that at several previous jobs, and this one even. There's enough other good things here that I just deal with it, but I don't like it).

Just because no one is actively and loudly complaining about it doesn't mean there must be no one that has a problem with it.

Perhaps every single other employee has a problem with it besides you, and they're just not speaking about it.

Post reply on HN