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Science, Superstition, and Open Plan Offices

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Re: Science, Superstition, and Open Plan Offices

#51

Post by existencebox »

saryant wrote: post #19
facepalm wrote: post #13

I suppose open plan has some advantages, like it is more hip (makes for great "we are a family" pictures), and the "team building" might make people less likely to leave their jobs. Just guessing - in any case there might be effects that offset the lower productivity. Otoh I was floored to read today that Amazon apparently has lots of dogs in their offices because it is supposedly good for the atmosphere, lower stres…

My company is co-located with another company and they encourage dogs in the office. My question has always been: what if you want to hire someone with a dog allergy? Worse: what if the person isn't currently local and there aren't any dogs in the office the day they happen to come in but relocate only to find they can't possibly work in that office?

While I was at google, I had (and have) a minor pet dander allergy. There were _many_ dogs regularly in the office, and perhaps I'm being overly paranoid/judgemental of the culture, but mentioning your own discomfort would have been read very negatively against you by not only the dog owners but by all the people who do buy in to that it is some part of the culture.

Whether you read that as a feature or a frustration, it comes down to that it simply becomes another line item that potential candidates may be judging you on, and you may never know about it. (it's certainly something I keep an eye out for nowadays.)

Re: Science, Superstition, and Open Plan Offices

#52

Post by michaelochurch »

typicalrunt wrote: post #40
michaelochurch wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fit interviews are hard for engineers. Technical interviews are about getting the right answer. Fit interviews are about whether you can tell a convincing lie ("of course I like the working under tight deadlines to changing requirements with minimal support from the business.") It's a tough context switch: from zero-in-on-right-answer to socially-acceptable-bald-faced-lie.

I half-agree with you, because there are some companies that use "fit" to determine how much they can use you as a "resource" rather than a human being. Where I disagree is whether one has put themselves in a situation where they are desperate for a position at a company where they have to lie to pass the fit interview stage. I'd rather be honest and lose than lie, win and ultimately impugn my integrity. It is very r…

I fully agree with you... and yet we disagree on a matter about the outside world.

My experience is that good companies are about 5%, at least weighted by jobs that are on the market. (There could be more good companies that are small or rarely have to hire.) I might be off and it might be higher, but not by much. They're rare, and they're selective, and they tend to grow slowly.

Most people are going to have to swing from one crappy company to another until they find something good. Once you have something legit, you definitely want to hold on to it for a good few years.

Also, on a practical note, there are good teams within crappy companies that are still worth working for. I wouldn't advise, say, most large tech companies or investment banks in general, but most of those huge companies have teams that are really good and make it worth taking the job.

I'd rather be honest and lose than lie, win and ultimately impugn my integrity.

I used to feel this way, but ultimately I'm of more use to the world if I'm occasionally willing to part with honesty. If I see someone in the grocery store who's 400 pounds, shouting "You're obese and if you don't stop eating that crap, you're gonna die!" does no one any favors. It's "honest", but worthlessly so.

Re: Science, Superstition, and Open Plan Offices

#53

Post by kyledj »

pyre wrote: post #29
astalwick wrote: post #17

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think that's one thing that gets missed in these discussions: software development is different from, say, accounting or administration or whatever. I get huge value out of being right beside the people that can answer the questions I have, and I know that they get value being near me. Putting walls between people and enforcing no-interruption work inhibits communication and makes it much easier to get blocked. At…

> I get huge value out of being right beside the people that can answer the questions I have As someone who -- in my workplace -- is more often than not on the receiving end of questions or calls for help, I find it extremely distracting. There have been entire days where I wasn't able to focus on my own work because everyone else had questions to answer, or bugs that they needed help working through. I can't fault t…

Then the question is whether team productivity has gone up, even though your own personal productivity may have gone down? You probably accomplished a lot being helpful, though I know that doesn't help how you feel. And if your performance is tied to personal productivity, then that is a real bummer.

Re: Science, Superstition, and Open Plan Offices

#54

Post by xiaoma »

>"Of course, scientists once thought that humans had 48 chromosomes. That partially hydrogenated vegetable oil was healthy. That egg yolks were bad for you."

Scientists still do think egg yolks are bad for you.

http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0021915012...

http://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&q=egg+yolk+consumpti...

Re: Science, Superstition, and Open Plan Offices

#55

Post by saryant »

existencebox wrote: post #51
saryant wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My company is co-located with another company and they encourage dogs in the office. My question has always been: what if you want to hire someone with a dog allergy? Worse: what if the person isn't currently local and there aren't any dogs in the office the day they happen to come in but relocate only to find they can't possibly work in that office?

While I was at google, I had (and have) a minor pet dander allergy. There were _many_ dogs regularly in the office, and perhaps I'm being overly paranoid/judgemental of the culture, but mentioning your own discomfort would have been read very negatively against you by not only the dog owners but by all the people who do buy in to that it is some part of the culture. Whether you read that as a feature or a frustration…

Personally, I think it's wholly inappropriate to put an employee in that situation, especially since new employees can't speak up as freely as those with a longer tenure at the organization. You can't just show up and start rocking the boat.

Re: Science, Superstition, and Open Plan Offices

#56

Post by hollerith »

frisco wrote: post #37

I was really sympathetic to the distractions caused by an open plan office. I saw the statistics that people get sick more often. I knew it would be annoying to have it potentially be really loud (or have everyone need to be quiet to keep it not loud). My company's new office is going to be open plan, though. Why? Because an office costs about $15k to build. We're already spending six figures on construction (ha ha b…

Am curious whether you will work in the open-plan office. In other words, when the new office is ready, will you get a room with a door that closes?

Re: Science, Superstition, and Open Plan Offices

#57

Post by sheepmullet »

jamieb wrote: post #15

Here's another quote: "For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong." My experience, anecdotal as it is, is that an open space per team is the most effective. This being science, when has the truth ever been precisely one end of the spectrum or the other? I'm naturally skeptical of pundits, advocating science, who point out that developers with their own office perform better than dev…

"In contrast most teams I work with collaborate at the feature level: engineers work on the same feature, implementing different pieces together, before moving on to the next feature"

Collaboration is much better with private offices. If Steve and Jim and Sally are working on a feature together then they can all take their laptops into Steves office and work on it together.

On the other hand even something as simple as pair programming in an open office can disturb dozens of other people. Where I work teams will book out meeting rooms for a few days at a time just to be able to collaborate without annoying the rest of the floor.

Re: Science, Superstition, and Open Plan Offices

#58

Post by mabbo »

frisco wrote: post #47
mabbo wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's assume my office employs 100 people, at around $100,000 per year each. If a $15k office would make us 10% more efficient, then it would pay for itself in 18 months. Open plan offices are penny-wise and pound-foolish.

That's a $1.5M investment up front. Maybe it will make you 10% more efficient, but I have to look at all of the different things I could spend $1.5M on. Hopefully there's something in there for a growing company with an expected IRR of more than 10% over 18 months. In parallel, how many months of runway do you have? I'm guessing it's not 18, much less the 36+ you'd want to really see those benefits pay off even if it…

I'm talking about a 100 person office, not some start-up living off VC. At 100 people, you're going to be spending $10m on salaries alone each year. $1.5m isn't nothing, but it's close. And for a company with 100 employees, a 10% gain for that price is worth every penny.

Mind you, the 10% figure is totally made up. Maybe it's 50%, maybe it's 0.5%. But if I had to guess a number, I'd call it 10% on average.

Re: Science, Superstition, and Open Plan Offices

#59

Post by sheepmullet »

nsxwolf wrote: post #44
greenyoda wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Peopleware was published in 1987. This body of research is not something that suddenly sprang up in 2014.

So are people not allowed to prefer open office layouts? They're not allowed to discern what works for them, because there couldn't possibly be any variables that make the results of some study irrelevant to their unique situation? Edit: It would appear the answer is "no", no one is to be allowed make that decision. HN hates open plans more than they hate sexism.

So meet us "private office folks" half way and have enough private offices and open space for everyone. That way if you want to work in the open office section you can but the rest of us aren't forced into low productivity and constant low level anxiety simply because you enjoy it.

Re: Science, Superstition, and Open Plan Offices

#60

Post by nsxwolf »

sheepmullet wrote: post #59
nsxwolf wrote: post #44

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So are people not allowed to prefer open office layouts? They're not allowed to discern what works for them, because there couldn't possibly be any variables that make the results of some study irrelevant to their unique situation? Edit: It would appear the answer is "no", no one is to be allowed make that decision. HN hates open plans more than they hate sexism.

So meet us "private office folks" half way and have enough private offices and open space for everyone. That way if you want to work in the open office section you can but the rest of us aren't forced into low productivity and constant low level anxiety simply because you enjoy it.

That sounds like a reasonable compromise, but I'll need to see some studies before trying it.
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