Open Floor Plan Offices

[matthewb0051]

Since it was brought up in the Open Concept Floorplan house thread, I'll start it here for offices.

I've seen it good and bad. One of my last Army assignments all the staff and senior leaders had offices. Then there was an open cubicle space for others to work. That was pretty good.

I worked at GSA (General Services Administration) in DC in a building that was constructed in 1919. They've opened that up and do 'hotel' office(ing). So no one has an office except for the Secretary level boss, IG, and General Counsel's office.

Everyone has to schedule a space for daily work and you just bring your laptop with you. So you can end up sitting next to people not even from your section. "Can" because when I was there most sections had sort of laid claim to particular areas and reserved them exclusively.

My take was it really cut down on work flow and product, I believe there was actually a study produced that proved just that. Hard to go speak to someone face to face, which is only amplified now with more remote work.

[masraum]

I've worked in a couple of places where there were "cubes" but the walls were only waist high (really, they weren't cubes, but were desks with short partitions).
I actually liked those. I've worked in both styles

these were pretty good, but the dividers stopped at the solid portion without the clear glass above.

I've also worked in an area where there were taupe, fairly small cubes that were ~6' tall with anemic flourescent lighting and the floor was like rat mazes. The taupe color with small, tall-walled cubes was REALLY horrible. I was ready to quit almost immediately which worked out since I had actually already given notice. There was a small "door" opening, and that was it, everything else was taupe fabric. The walls were 6', and the ceiling was max 8'. It was by far the worst environment I've been in. I've a few times worked in the tall cubes with tall (~10') ceilings and that was better.

I've worked when visiting other offices, in what is called "trader's desks". That's pretty much what's pictured, elbow to elbow. It's better than the tall cubes, but not much since theres' no division between anyone.

[dw1]

Here is a summary of the science: https://www.workfront.com/blog/what-science-says-about-open-offices

Some time ago, my company tried an open office floor plan - briefly as it turned out.

In a technical environment when one has to concentrate on complex tasks, having someone else talking on the phone or having a brief "stand up" meeting behind you head is extraordinarily distracting.

Not only did the open office result in significantly reduced productivity, mistakes were made, and for class III medical devices that is just flat out no good.

As a boss, I also quickly realized that giving people their own space was a sign of respect for them and their work.

Since I left that company, I have heard that some a*hole Operations VP decided the entire office area would be the small cubicle (5 ft x 5 ft) low-wall approach - the cheapest cubicles available - unless one is middle management or above, and then one gets a palatial office.

Needless to say, putting people with Master's (and even PhD) degrees in Engineering & Biology and many years of experience in tiny cubicles didn't go very well, in addition to the obvious tensions between "haves" vs "have nots", resulting in a significant number of departures, which of course may have been the intent all along.

[flatbutt]

Worked in that environment for years. It sucked...bigly.

[Jay Auskin]

I've worked in one for about 5 years. Love it. Who doesn't? The employees who like to jack around half the day. Hard to do that when not in a cube.

Post covid, it's proved to be better, as you can actually go and talk to who's in the office since you can actually see them. When done right, it works very well.

[Sooner or later]

Goodyear Corp had 100's of cubicles per floor. The first time I visited my jaw dropped, I had no idea.

They wanted me to move to Akron and work in that mess. I begged and pleaded, to get out of that transfer.

I ended up going to Union City, Tn so I could have an office in one of the project double wide mobile offices.

[id10t]

When they moved my old group to open office plan, we lost our teaching lab, spent more money than we would've with walls and doors, then had to spend even more money for phone head sets for all of us, and it totally changed how we work.

I've also noticed that no one who says "do an open office plan" actually has one of their own to work out of... With the PM that did ours since she used to work for the company the college uses for office stuff I just figured it was a way for her to get kickbacks to/from her old coworkers and implement the stupid expensive silly bad designs she always wanted to sell.

During the pre-sell "you get to pick your own office chair under $500" stage I was wearing my disposable foam shooting ear plugs due to the white noise generators (they drive me insane, I cannot think coherently with wierd nonsensical slightly random nose patterns). When I saw the plans included several including one right over my desk, I flat out told her that if they were installed I'd be coming in on nights and weekends with a pair of wire cutters and a step ladder. When asked why I pointed to my ear plugs and explained. WNGs were not installed in our area.

And then 9 months later my new boss pissed me off and I changed departments, immediately got back to office with door (that is expected to be closed when I'm in it though I usually don't), and recently turned down the chance at a office on 2nd floor with big window over looking the grassy commons (I don't do windows in my office when I have a choice, on computer or in the wall). I'm in a half-below ground area with a real light switch (always off, I run a dim desk lamp in the corner and bathe in the glow of my monitors), 40 steps from the coffee maker and surrounded by the systems and networking folk (all the other dev types are upstairs, and while my title is technically "Linux Admin" I spend 38 out of 40 hours coding and doing coding related stuff like picking users brains for a decent spec to work against)

[masraum]

Originally Posted by id10t

When they moved my old group to open office plan, we lost our teaching lab, spent more money than we would've with walls and doors, then had to spend even more money for phone head sets for all of us, and it totally changed how we work.

I've also noticed that no one who says "do an open office plan" actually has one of their own to work out of... With the PM that did ours since she used to work for the company the college uses for office stuff I just figured it was a way for her to get kickbacks to/from her old coworkers and implement the stupid expensive silly bad designs she always wanted to sell.

During the pre-sell "you get to pick your own office chair under $500" stage I was wearing my disposable foam shooting ear plugs due to the white noise generators (they drive me insane, I cannot think coherently with wierd nonsensical slightly random nose patterns). When I saw the plans included several including one right over my desk, I flat out told her that if they were installed I'd be coming in on nights and weekends with a pair of wire cutters and a step ladder. When asked why I pointed to my ear plugs and explained. WNGs were not installed in our area.

And then 9 months later my new boss pissed me off and I changed departments, immediately got back to office with door (that is expected to be closed when I'm in it though I usually don't), and recently turned down the chance at a office on 2nd floor with big window over looking the grassy commons (I don't do windows in my office when I have a choice, on computer or in the wall). I'm in a half-below ground area with a real light switch (always off, I run a dim desk lamp in the corner and bathe in the glow of my monitors), 40 steps from the coffee maker and surrounded by the systems and networking folk (all the other dev types are upstairs, and while my title is technically "Linux Admin" I spend 38 out of 40 hours coding and doing coding related stuff like picking users brains for a decent spec to work against)

I've never heard of people installing WNG, but yeah, that would be a big no.

I've been in some data centers where the white noise is deafening, and it would definitely keep me from being able to work well. I would never have been able to work in a data center with hundreds/thousands of fans on top of the AC noise.

I haven't been in an office since Covid started. For 2 years before that I was running over the ear noise cancelling headphones. I don't actually mind noise from other folks, but found that I love the noise canceling headphones, whether I'm streaming music or even just cutting down the background noise.