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High-performance employees need quieter work spaces

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Re: High-performance employees need quieter work spaces

#71

Post by adrianggg »

pklausler wrote: post #15

I guess that I fall into this characterization. Over my 36-year career, I've sat in solo offices with doors, shared offices, cubicles with progressively shorter walls, and wall-less high-density desk arrays. I've easily been twice as productive with a door as I am in a noisy environment -- all the other arrangements suck if there is even one inconsiderate human in the space making a phone call, moving a pound of mucu…

I do wonder why I have to purchase good headphones and wear them to combat this problem?

What are the long term impacts of wearing headphones? bacteria growth and hearing loss? Can't be good for my health long term.

Flow is a state of concentration, breaking flow take a longtime to get back in, shouting questions across the room is a context switch and not an asynchronous choice for me if I'm in the middle of something important.

The one inconsiderate person is the worst. The person unaware that their constant sniffing of mucus is awful. Usually the least intelligent person in the office IMO.

Usually the loudest and most obnoxious member of every team I've worked for seems to have the most production problems....coincidence?

Re: High-performance employees need quieter work spaces

#72

Post by nunez »

officelineback wrote: post #58
nunez wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I personally love open floor plans. It is so easy to talk to people and get answers and ideas about projects and the like. I don't see how free flowing collaborating through cubes is possible. The best permutation of open spaces and privacy that I've seen is a wide open space with quiet rooms and sharable offices. Work in the open space when you want, or work in the quiet room when you need some privacy. I wish that…

The thing is I like to get my workstation ergonomically perfect for my issues (I have back and shoulder issues) and using a generic table with no extra monitors for my quiet intense work sucks. It should be the other way around...everyone gets a private office, but has an option to join the fray in an open office area.

If everyone had an open office, then very few would use the open space area. Also, providing offices for everyone is expensive, and it's harder to collect people sitting in different offices than it is when everyone's in an open space. I'm personally against everyone getting an office, but we'll agree to disagree :)

Re: High-performance employees need quieter work spaces

#73

Post by Delmania »

solaris_7 wrote: post #8

The obsession for open plan offices continues to amaze me. Companies that invest huge amounts in staffing and other strategic programmes don't seem to spend much time challenging the default suggestion that 'openness = collaboration'. This article mentions high performance employees - but most knowledge workers (designers, programmers etc.) that I know all struggle with open plan office environments irrespective of t…

I've had exactly one experience with an open office space. That was enough to turn me off from any company that has it. It was loud and noisy.

When I had a review, my supervisor told me that people didn't find me approachable because I head my headphones on.

When I mentioned I need a quiet space, he told me to "deal with it". When I questioned him on whether he had worked in an open space, he said he had, because he had been a NOC manager.

Different worlds, I soon left. That was the moment I realized I hated traditional corporate culture. Improved to startup, which I loved, until the "CEO" proved he was incompentent and furloughed us...

Re: High-performance employees need quieter work spaces

#74

Post by officelineback »

bradstewart wrote: post #59
officelineback wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The thing is I like to get my workstation ergonomically perfect for my issues (I have back and shoulder issues) and using a generic table with no extra monitors for my quiet intense work sucks. It should be the other way around...everyone gets a private office, but has an option to join the fray in an open office area.

I had this setup at my previous company and it was truly fantastic.

Are you allowed to name names?

Re: High-performance employees need quieter work spaces

#75

Post by ThrustVectoring »

Clubber wrote: post #56
nsxwolf wrote: post #42

I made the mistake of thinking "open plan" meant low-walled cubes. Because I've been working longer than this fad existed. I think we had even used the term back then. I didn't get why people were suddenly whining about them. Then I saw a real "open plan" office. Holy shit. Why aren't workers violently revolting?

Being able to yell across the room while sitting down is more efficient than having to stand up first. Efficient collaberating. This is a good metric. It's also the only metric we track. Science! /s What you are referring to is a "cube farm." Businesses have somehow discovered how to make working conditions worse.

Don't forget not having to stand up to wave your hand in my peripheral vision to get my attention for something that the commit messages that introduced the change would have told you about.

I might be a little salty about that one.

Re: High-performance employees need quieter work spaces

#76

Post by arca_vorago »

technics256 wrote: post #69
arca_vorago wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You sound like my old boss. I'm a combat vet, and he said to me, before memorial day, "What's a holiday? I don't take holidays. I'm here all the time.." Pissed me off. Dude is the CEO and partial owner, so it's completely different. If they want to pretend to be Elon Musk and want me to as well, they better at least pay like it to justify the lack of work/life balance. I am a human being whose existence is entirely i…

As an American who moved to Germany, that mindset was completely removed here. Not only do people tell you to take your vacation time if you don't, they get worried if you are working too much or too hard. It's a great relief to be here and see a different mindset outside that of the "all work no holiday" cultures you can find in the states.

Honestly I sometimes wonder how much my traveling and experiencing other cultures influenced my perception of this subject. Even in Iraq I feel like the Arab concept of time (flexible guidelines) really rubbed off on me, spent some time in Germany/France as well and loved how slow life could be.

In this day and age I feel like all many people want is retired-style life but then they entangle themselves in debt and job quagmires they don't excape till they are 65. I also highly disagree with the characterization that retirement is sitting around doing nothing. Retirement to me is the chance to pursue your true passions and interests unencumbered by an unrelated need for finances supplied by a wage-slavery job.

Re: High-performance employees need quieter work spaces

#77

Post by [deleted] »

adrianggg wrote: post #71
pklausler wrote: post #15

I guess that I fall into this characterization. Over my 36-year career, I've sat in solo offices with doors, shared offices, cubicles with progressively shorter walls, and wall-less high-density desk arrays. I've easily been twice as productive with a door as I am in a noisy environment -- all the other arrangements suck if there is even one inconsiderate human in the space making a phone call, moving a pound of mucu…

I do wonder why I have to purchase good headphones and wear them to combat this problem? What are the long term impacts of wearing headphones? bacteria growth and hearing loss? Can't be good for my health long term. Flow is a state of concentration, breaking flow take a longtime to get back in, shouting questions across the room is a context switch and not an asynchronous choice for me if I'm in the middle of somethi…

[deleted]

Re: High-performance employees need quieter work spaces

#78

Post by organsnyder »

taurath wrote: post #41
organsnyder wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The collaborative nature of my open office environment helps me to generate tons of great ideas that I'll never have the focus to implement.

Why don't you just stay late or come in early, don't you care about the company?!!

I actually have quite a bit of freedom to work from home. But I have three kids six and younger, so it's hard to concentrate there...

Re: High-performance employees need quieter work spaces

#79

Post by kafkaesq »

Rubbish. It is exactly through their ability to "soldier on" in spite of intense and sometimes challenging surroundings that high-performing employees distinguish themselves as such.

And on top of this, remember that the other way your best performers distinguish themselves is in the fact that they most definitely are not complainers. So if any of your employees start yapping about your proposed move to an open plan environment (or even have the temerity to suggest that if you are going to have an open plan environment, people at least "try to keep down their voice down a bit"), then congratulations -- you've just identified an employee that's definitely not right for your organization, and will likely because more trouble and distraction for your team down the road -- for as long as you keep them on board, that is.†

† Of course I'm being facetious. But this but a slightly cheeky paraphrase of the exact logic I've actually had used on me, to my face, to justify not just the hyperdense, pack-em-in-like-it's-veal-slaughtering-pen office plans which are apparently a peak popularity, these days -- but a whole range of obnoxious environmental factors --- e.g. loud TVs, loud muzack (or any TV or muzack in "the pen", for that matter); or just loud, gratuitously chatty co-workers -- in plenty of environments I've had the misfortune of being stuck in. Until I realized I just wasn't "a fit" for these places, that is.

Re: High-performance employees need quieter work spaces

#80

Post by fmap »

solaris_7 wrote: post #8

The obsession for open plan offices continues to amaze me. Companies that invest huge amounts in staffing and other strategic programmes don't seem to spend much time challenging the default suggestion that 'openness = collaboration'. This article mentions high performance employees - but most knowledge workers (designers, programmers etc.) that I know all struggle with open plan office environments irrespective of t…

This whole situation is ridiculous. I am working in a university and I have my own office. Turns out that employees are by far the most expensive part about doing research in computer science, and the cost of giving everyone their own office is easily offset by the (noticable) increase in productivity.

Everyone I know who went on to an industry position is working in an open plan office... and it is not unusual to hear stories about people putting in a few days of home office to get some actual work done.

This is obviously anecdotal, but based on other responses in this thread and elsewhere there is more than enough evidence to justify doing a real study. It is not difficult to measure changes in productivity over time accross a sufficiently large population and the amount of money being spent on engineers means that even a marginal increase in productivity will be worth the cost.

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