Open Offices

Since some startups didn't have money to create good facilities, and they succeeded, others stupidly copied the idea. Planners decided that if Google/Facebook/Twitter succeeded in spite of a horrendously distracted working environment, then everyone should suffer. Corporate America (especially Tech) started shifting to Open Office to the annoyance of tech workers everywhere. This was sold as "more collaborative", but distracting is more accurate. ℹ️ Info           ~ Aristotle Sabouni Created: 2019-01-14

Facts

• Planners who failed at life decided that if Google/Facebook/etc. succeeded in spite of a horrendously distracted working environment, then Corporate America (especially Tech) started shifting to Open Office to the annoyance of workers everywhere.

• This was sold as "more collaborative", but a lot of work requires focus (free of distractions). There have been multiple studies that bear out that workers get MORE quiet to keep from disturbing others, hide away in meeting rooms, or work with headphones to create faux privacy. They get less collaborative.

• One-size-fits-all fits many really poorly.

• The real incentives were placing facility costs over individual productivity
  • Population density can go up
  • But if you do it without fixing facilities (parking, loading/unloading, power or food/toilets), then you create new problems
  • The results have been productivity killing, increased employee friction, increased illness/sick-time, less face-to-face interaction, and more start working from home or as remote as can get away with.
  • Companies try to combat the backlash against open office by mandating people must come in to the office more.

Conclusion

This will go down as proof that companies that ignore management fads operate much better than those that follow them.

COVID hit open office much harder than those that had kept personal space.

Open Floorplans

           Main article: Open Floorplans

Open Floorplans: a really bad idea brought into popularity by idiots and bean counters. (Adobe went to Open Floorplans while I was there, to the grousing of most but a few corporate sycophants). Then COVID hit, vindicating all of us who pointed out that they are disease passing, producitivity killing, open septic tanks. COVID converted me from anbout to leave, to happy remote worker.

Introverts

           Main article: Introverts

Companies will tell you that they care about inclusiveness, then they'll institute Open Floorplans which are torture for Introverts. What they're saying is, "we respect individuals... just not enough to treat introverts with respect"... at least not when there's cost-cutting by packing them cheek to cheek with their neighbor.

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🔗 More

Tech Technology: Organizations, Reviews, People

Organizations Organizations that I felt the need to comment on (more often on the negs than the positives). But there's good/bad in all.

🔗 Links

• https://www.inc.com/geoffrey-james/its-official-open-plan-offices-are-now-dumbest-management-fad-of-all-time.html
• https://www.inc.com/geoffrey-james/science-just-proved-that-open-plan-offices-destroy-productivity.html
• https://www.newyorker.com/business/currency/the-open-office-trap
• http://www.bbc.com/capital/story/20170105-open-offices-are-damaging-our-memories
• https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/on-leadership/wp/2015/04/22/office-designers-find-open-plan-spaces-are-actually-lousy-for-workers/
• https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2014/12/30/google-got-it-wrong-the-open-office-trend-is-destroying-the-workplace/
• Panopticon: https://www.mcsweeneys.net/articles/our-open-plan-office-failed-so-were-moving-to-a-towering-panopticon
• Study: https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rstb.2017.0239#d3e1265

Solutions:

• Passive-Aggressive response to Open Offices? https://www.theatlantic.com/video/index/486161/i-stopped-showering/
• https://www.cnet.com/news/would-you-wear-this-muzzle-around-the-office-for-private-calling/

Tags: Tech  Organizations