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I went to the office for the first time. I fucking hated it

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Re: I went to the office for the first time. I fucking hated it

#341

Post by ChrisMarshallNY »

In my case, I worked in offices for over 30 years. I was pretty damn productive (at least, I didn’t get fired, and was steadily promoted, so I guess I did OK). For the first dozen years, it was “shirt and tie.” I learned to keep a couple of suits up to date; even after going “business casual” (I never worked in jeans and T-shirt).

Since working from home for almost the last 4 years, my productivity has gone stratospheric. It’s freaking amazing.

I still maintain a lot of personal “office discipline,” like dressing in jeans and a button-down shirt, even though I may not be going out anywhere. I also limit breaks (but I take them whenever I want, and sometimes, they may be an hour or so).

I work whenever I want. Early morning is my most productive time. I often get more done by 8:30AM, than I used to get done all day, in the office (8:30 was my usual starting time).

But not everyone is able to work this way. I don’t have small children (if you don’t count the cats), and I spend just about every second of work time, coding.

I have a dedicated office space, with a standing desk. No sitting on the couch, with a laptop. No Starbucks tables. My equipment is top-notch. I have a monitor that extends across my entire desk. I have a decent laptop, but its screen seems ridiculously small. My next laptop will be even smaller. I’m spoiled rotten.

I have tremendous self-discipline; partly because I’m a high-school dropout with a GED, and have had to fight for Every. Damn. Thing. in my career. I’ve never had one blessed thing handed to me. It was infuriating, but it taught me to stay disciplined, focused and productive; despite almost ceaseless adversity. Not everyone’s experience, but it made me who I am today.

I have no idea if things would be better for me by now, if I’d had a smoother road. I could easily see myself “going to fat,” so to speak. I probably would not have been so well-prepared for at-home work.

But that was just my experience. YMMV.

Re: I went to the office for the first time. I fucking hated it

#342

Post by balfirevic »

foxpurple wrote: post #261
dkdbejwi383 wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Rush hour sucks though even if you use the metro/tram/bus/train. The idea that the majority of the adult population should be travelling either in or out of the city centre at the same time seems quite preposterous now.

They shouldn’t be travelling that far at all. They should be within a walkable distance of where they need to go. Walking to work is never stressful and often does reverse.

Should they move if they switch jobs? What if their spouse works at the other side of the city?

Re: I went to the office for the first time. I fucking hated it

#344

Post by specproc »

beardface wrote: post #194
CephalopodMD wrote: post #119

I just want my own office. That's all. I'd be pretty okay with going in if I had my own office with 4 walls. First job of my career, they told me I would have an office of my own. First day I come back do for full time (I had interned there too with my own office), they tell me they're switching buildings to go open office in about a month's time. I got a precious few weeks with a personal office, and then it was all…

I work remotely and rent an office in town. It's a 15 minute walk from my house, a decent size (~22m^2), all my own, and well set up. I love it and pay gladly but I it's not possible for everyone. I used to have a garden office but my wife now needs her own space for her work so I took the rented space. A dedicated space is a must if you're working remotely. Either at home or offsite. I have no objection to going int…

Yeah, I live somewhere that's very cheap indeed by the standards of most people reading this thread. I spend about USD 150 a month on a small office and it's brilliant.

Get all the benefits of office space (i.e., time out of the house, different mental space) with none of the downsides. I've got a couple of spare desks, so if I'm working on something with other people, or just wanna have friends hang out and work it's all doable.

Re: I went to the office for the first time. I fucking hated it

#345

Post by sumo89 »

For all the upsides of working remotely and especially for 100% remote I think the downside is it can become very transactional. Write code for x hours, the clock ticks to 6pm and you leave to do something else. I'm not saying everyone has to have a great passion for their work and ultimately we're all doing it to put food on the table but it seems to me that it's a recipe for becoming disillusioned with it all. You don't have to be great friends with your colleagues but if you're enjoying your work or the atmosphere of work, having a chat to people over lunch, going to pub every now and then, the odd team pizza trip or whatever, then after 10 years you may still be enjoying it. At the very least it breaks up the days so they aren't all the same. But clocking on at 9am to write code for 8 hours while talking to a moving image of someone's face once a day is a recipe for hating it in the long term.

Re: I went to the office for the first time. I fucking hated it

#346

Post by tut-urut-utut »

thefz wrote: post #326
ohhnoodont wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This may just be my experience as a young person in San Francisco / Silicon Valley, but it's very common for office life and social life to be highly intertwined. I don't necessarily see this as a bad thing. Many of us moved here and joined competitive, demanding companies. People bond in these situations. I really look forward to being back in the office and having a significant part of my social life return. Don't…

> it's very common for office life and social life to be highly intertwined Until there's a conflict of interest between the two zones or between two colleagues and it all goes to shit. Trust me, keep work and friends separated.

> Trust me, keep work and friends separated.

That's what you do by changing jobs. When you move on to the next company, those guys you met on the job become just "out of work friends".

Re: I went to the office for the first time. I fucking hated it

#347

Post by prox »

colechristensen wrote: post #258
prox wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that makes a big difference! Cubicles should be outlawed really, or at least optional. Seems like an archaic thing to me. For my own contracted jobs I went to place that had you choose between an open plan or a small room workplace. All flexible. So I think you are right, if we had more choice, people are happier. Hubs are also a great way forward I think. Maybe there are some exceptions, like high security o…

A cubicle had at least the resemblance of a piece of space I could call my own. My worst experience involved commuting two hours by train to a high rise, tiny "open plan" office space (read: a few important people got offices, the rest of us were in one not very big room). It was like a sort of torture... for up to 15 hours a day the only escape from being within a several feet of and in eyeline of half a dozen peopl…

Yeah that sounds ugly! Personally I don’t think could stand that either. You need time to be able to shut off from the social hubbub.

Re: I went to the office for the first time. I fucking hated it

#348

Post by Tade0 »

solatic wrote: post #123

Sounds like the relationship is dysfunctional in both directions. On the one hand, the employer set up a panopticon in the office, with crappy furniture, lots of interruptions, a crappy office kitchen, no decent food (i.e. needing to bring food from home). Garbage in, garbage out. Of course nobody is happy to sit in traffic to come to an environment like that. Then we have the author, who has the mistaken idea that t…

> Not relationship-building, just pure "shut up and let me sit down and get my work done."

It's entirely possible to build relationships remotely.

I'm sort of a job hopper and also work 80% remotely on average, with two-week-long visits to the office. Throughout the years I always stayed in touch with at least one person from the previous projects.

Most of these relationships were built entirely remotely and were much stronger than those made during my time at the office.

It's likely a question of preference, but it's not like someone working remotely has to necessarily have a "business only" approach.

Re: I went to the office for the first time. I fucking hated it

#349

Post by ozim »

solatic wrote: post #123

Sounds like the relationship is dysfunctional in both directions. On the one hand, the employer set up a panopticon in the office, with crappy furniture, lots of interruptions, a crappy office kitchen, no decent food (i.e. needing to bring food from home). Garbage in, garbage out. Of course nobody is happy to sit in traffic to come to an environment like that. Then we have the author, who has the mistaken idea that t…

Do you see where the author is coming from? I believe he is a developer (or even junior) that has a scrum master or some kind of manager and has tasks and sprint points assigned to him. If he does not finish his "commitment" in points in their designated time, people will ask him "why it took so long?" and maybe put him on improvement plan.

Productivity is the most important for him and people like him, because that is expected from him and he is measured against that. No one is going to nag about him not paying attention in one or the other meeting. He will get people nagging when he does not deliver.

He dislikes things that get in a way of what he is supposed to do. Then we all know you cannot say you did not made your commitment because you had to attend 10 meetings, this will be taken as making up excuses.

Re: I went to the office for the first time. I fucking hated it

#350

Post by baby »

chii wrote: post #339
isatty wrote: post #333

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I can’t believe such over generalized garbage is upvoted on HN. Everyone’s job is different, everyone is different. There are productive engineers who are introverts and there are productive engineers who are extroverts. Making jokes in the office and having conversations does not take time away from doing good work - no dev is productive 100% of the time. Humans are social animals, and working _with_ someone is impo…

> everyone is different. and yet, you assert > Humans are social animals, and working _with_ someone is important. The most productive engineers are all different. But empirical evidence has suggested that those who are _the most productive_, such as people like Carmack, are productive in isolation (see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=16518726 about his programming vacations). Of course, i don't deny there are p…

That’s awesome to read. I remember taking half a week before going to black hat in las vegas, and staying alone is some off the strip hotel. The amount of work I would crush was absurd, managed to finish a bunch of projects. I really miss these opportunities to spend a week somewhere else alone to have time to focus on what I want.
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