How workers ended up in cubes – and how they could break free(economist.com)
economist.com
How workers ended up in cubes – and how they could break free
http://www.economist.com/news/international/21637359-how-workers-ended-up-cubesand-how-they-could-break-free-inside-box
22 comments
The Economist are being rather disingenuous here. They explain how the cubicle is a bad thing, and then they go on to try to convince us that the demise of the cubicle and it's replacement by more open plan type offices is a good thing. But the open type office is even worse for many of the same reasons why the cubicle was bad.
They just say that cubicles are bad:
> it has become increasingly clear that far from offering a clever compromise between the economy of open-plan and the privacy of individual offices, cubicles are in many ways worse than either.
But also say that open office plans are bad:
> And last year Swedish researchers studying the link between office layouts and illness found that people who worked in open-plan offices had the highest risk of becoming ill. The reason, they concluded, was more than just the easier spread of infections. Stress caused by lack of privacy and workers’ inability to control their surroundings played a part, too.
> Open-plan offices are noisier and more interruption-prone. Too much noise causes high blood pressure, sleep problems and difficulty in concentrating. And cubicles’ flimsy walls do little to dampen sound. In studies where sound levels were raised from 39 to 51 decibels—roughly equivalent to moving from an average living room to a road with light traffic—participants were more tired and less motivated.
> it has become increasingly clear that far from offering a clever compromise between the economy of open-plan and the privacy of individual offices, cubicles are in many ways worse than either.
But also say that open office plans are bad:
> And last year Swedish researchers studying the link between office layouts and illness found that people who worked in open-plan offices had the highest risk of becoming ill. The reason, they concluded, was more than just the easier spread of infections. Stress caused by lack of privacy and workers’ inability to control their surroundings played a part, too.
> Open-plan offices are noisier and more interruption-prone. Too much noise causes high blood pressure, sleep problems and difficulty in concentrating. And cubicles’ flimsy walls do little to dampen sound. In studies where sound levels were raised from 39 to 51 decibels—roughly equivalent to moving from an average living room to a road with light traffic—participants were more tired and less motivated.
Am I the only person who doesn't mind working in a cube? The small space doesn't really bother me and I have walls for blocking out visual distractions. Beats open plan offices, for me at least.
Define "mind." I've had offices. I've had traditional high-wall cubes. I've had open-ish plans. I work at home a fair bit. I'm OK with working just about anywhere. If I had my druthers, I'd take an office given the choice--though I've had a dark interior office and cubes with a decent view and that's a factor too. I suppose my revealed preference is that I prefer quiet given that I don't usually put music on when I'm working at home.
But I don't really have a lot of trouble with distraction and will just put on headphones if I really need to focus.
But I don't really have a lot of trouble with distraction and will just put on headphones if I really need to focus.
I've worked in short cubes, tall group-cubes (3-4 people were cube room) and offices (both shared and solitary). In my current cube layout, we have a general practice where if a conversation is going to be large and boisterous enough, generally it's held in a private room off to the side. We have several of those.
I'm comfortable in all of them. I do find myself needing headphones more often in the short cube environment; but, that's not really a big issue to me.
I don't think I would like the open layout. Something about people walking by always being able to see what's on my monitor bothers me; and I'm currently in a situation where my boss could see my monitor if he chose to look up. Still not as bothering as a completely open layout.
So, I don't see anything wrong with cubes.
edit: I should have also mentioned that I wore headphones when I had my own office, too, because walls aren't soundproof, generally.
I'm comfortable in all of them. I do find myself needing headphones more often in the short cube environment; but, that's not really a big issue to me.
I don't think I would like the open layout. Something about people walking by always being able to see what's on my monitor bothers me; and I'm currently in a situation where my boss could see my monitor if he chose to look up. Still not as bothering as a completely open layout.
So, I don't see anything wrong with cubes.
edit: I should have also mentioned that I wore headphones when I had my own office, too, because walls aren't soundproof, generally.
I long for a high walled cube. It's like an office without a door! I have the 4-foot high cube variety and people are always sneaking up on me from behind and my coat drags the ground when I hang it up.
I loathe cubes, the article resonates with me as this configuration combines the worst of most worlds. The pseudo-privacy of cubes does little to block noise and promotes anti-social actions.
“Cubicles even make people behave badly. Researchers at Cornell studied 229 employees at eight firms and found that those in cubicles were more prone than those in open-plan offices to have long, loud conversations—sometimes unrelated to work—with colleagues or on the phone.”
The key to making open offices work in a software development environment is fundamentally about having sufficiently low density, and having management giving a shit about basic conflicts.
“Cubicles even make people behave badly. Researchers at Cornell studied 229 employees at eight firms and found that those in cubicles were more prone than those in open-plan offices to have long, loud conversations—sometimes unrelated to work—with colleagues or on the phone.”
The key to making open offices work in a software development environment is fundamentally about having sufficiently low density, and having management giving a shit about basic conflicts.
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My office is kind of a mix of both. A group of semi-open cubes for each team with a lot of common spaces where people go when they feel cooped up. I like it. I get a private space where I can have plants but I can also go grab a seat on a couch or near the break room TV if I am feeling restless.
They buried the lede, and put half of it in parenthesis:
"In 1994 the average North American office worker had 90 square feet of space. By 2010 this was 75 square feet. (Executive management gained floor space over the same period, according to the International Facility Management Association.)"
"In 1994 the average North American office worker had 90 square feet of space. By 2010 this was 75 square feet. (Executive management gained floor space over the same period, according to the International Facility Management Association.)"
There are not that many executive managers, and they get to decide what to do with floor space. It's like setting your own salary, which they also get to do.
Could this have something to do with economics as well? There are high returns to working in big concentrated cities. So if rents in city centres are expensive, but people still want to work specifically there, they will compromise instead by paying for less office space. How much more expensive would it be to give everyone an average of 90sqft (8.36m^2) of space?
Not that any of this is good, but to pin this undesirable outcome on a specific cause, I think one would need more precise evidence.
Could this have something to do with economics as well? There are high returns to working in big concentrated cities. So if rents in city centres are expensive, but people still want to work specifically there, they will compromise instead by paying for less office space. How much more expensive would it be to give everyone an average of 90sqft (8.36m^2) of space?
Not that any of this is good, but to pin this undesirable outcome on a specific cause, I think one would need more precise evidence.
Related article in today's washington post.
Google got it wrong. The open-office trend is destroying the workplace.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2014/12/30/g...
Google got it wrong. The open-office trend is destroying the workplace.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2014/12/30/g...
I once read an article about a college that put in new sidewalks and landscaping, only to find the students and staff leaving dirt paths through their expensive lawns. They wisely ripped out all the sidewalks and put in lawn everywhere. They later went back and paved the pathways that were created by people going where they needed to go by the shortest route possible.
It seems to me no one has tried something similar with offices. Maybe someone should.
It seems to me no one has tried something similar with offices. Maybe someone should.
I'm a bit confused trying to apply your analogy to offices; I doubt you meant that we should install grass on the floor and nothing else :) one possible interpretation is to start with just a big empty space, and let people buy or bring in whatever furniture they want, but that seems pretty problematic w.r.t. logistics, people picking things which will last / are affordable ("I work best in this CLS AMG with leather massage seats parked in the corner").
Could you please explain your idea in more detail?
Could you please explain your idea in more detail?
The book "Peopleware" has a similar idea, in that you offer all kinds of enviroments, and people get to pick what fits their personality and team needs.
Altought starting from raw material and space, allocating some of them for people, some for tasks, and letting teams roam freely also looks promissing. It will require a lot of redesigning, but that may even be a good thing.
Altought starting from raw material and space, allocating some of them for people, some for tasks, and letting teams roam freely also looks promissing. It will require a lot of redesigning, but that may even be a good thing.
I would hope that someone smarter and more knowledgeable than myself on the subject would come up with something actually good. Barring that, yes, I thought about starting with a large empty space and some sort of supply of furnishings with general guidelines about who gets what and how much. Perhaps there could be an area with "samples" of things that people could try out and decide what was a good fit for them as an individual.
I worked in a cubicle farm for five years. The company added space after I was hired because they were growing. Then the recession hit and some of that new space remained empty and unused. They began converting desks that had never been used into meeting spaces. Meanwhile, teams were generally each assigned the same amount of space yet had varying numbers of members. So I saw both some good and creative adaptations and some poor general practices.
Some years ago, when I was a homeschooling mom taking college classes online and every member of the household had their own computer, my very introverted husband had the most privacy for his desk area, our youngest son had the second most -- again, he was quite introverted -- our older son, less introverted than his father and brother had the third most private desk area and my office space was in the most heavily trafficked part of the apartment. I was the only extrovert and my duties and mom and wife required me to be available to other people at pretty much all times. The arrangement that evolved fit our individual personalities and our working situations. We were all happy with our respective desk arrangements. Surely the corporate world would benefit from making sure people were individually comfortable with their work spaces and when you multiply the increased productivity by hundreds of employees, this should matter to someone?
I worked in a cubicle farm for five years. The company added space after I was hired because they were growing. Then the recession hit and some of that new space remained empty and unused. They began converting desks that had never been used into meeting spaces. Meanwhile, teams were generally each assigned the same amount of space yet had varying numbers of members. So I saw both some good and creative adaptations and some poor general practices.
Some years ago, when I was a homeschooling mom taking college classes online and every member of the household had their own computer, my very introverted husband had the most privacy for his desk area, our youngest son had the second most -- again, he was quite introverted -- our older son, less introverted than his father and brother had the third most private desk area and my office space was in the most heavily trafficked part of the apartment. I was the only extrovert and my duties and mom and wife required me to be available to other people at pretty much all times. The arrangement that evolved fit our individual personalities and our working situations. We were all happy with our respective desk arrangements. Surely the corporate world would benefit from making sure people were individually comfortable with their work spaces and when you multiply the increased productivity by hundreds of employees, this should matter to someone?
On the other hand, having a real grass floor in the office, if it could be kept healthy, would be kind of awesome. You'd have to let a lot more light in. The air would probably be fresher. You couldn't use those cheap-ass rolling chairs. IDK, I might like to try it.
I heard a version of that about Ohio State University, looking at the map makes me think it's at least partially true:
https://goo.gl/maps/I4aON
https://goo.gl/maps/I4aON
Just this morning, my firm moved its office and now my team is in adjacent cubes instead of an open bullpen, and I was quite surprised at my own excitement to finally have a cube again. Semi-privacy! A noise barrier!
But there are really more choices, and I feel the article continues to push this false dichotomy: <i>"What workers need from their offices has long been clear. A flexible workspace that encourages movement, combined with mobile technology, could finally liberate them from the cubicle farm"</i>
Is that really what we need? Is there really anyone who prefers either of these choices over a private office, with ample meeting rooms and conference tables when there need to be group discussions?
But there are really more choices, and I feel the article continues to push this false dichotomy: <i>"What workers need from their offices has long been clear. A flexible workspace that encourages movement, combined with mobile technology, could finally liberate them from the cubicle farm"</i>
Is that really what we need? Is there really anyone who prefers either of these choices over a private office, with ample meeting rooms and conference tables when there need to be group discussions?
Piketty's 'Capital in the 21st century' raised the claim that the returns on capital are starting to outweight the increases in productivity. Is the diminishing of office space actually a side-effect of this? If the penny in investments gives better returns than the penny spent in worker productivity then open plan pens - excuse me, offices, would actually make sense.
>> About 30% of the staff have no permanent desk.
Lacking a permanent desk would leave me constantly wondering if my position were also temporary. Even when I worked for a consulting firm who kept me on-site with the client 100% of the time, I had a permanent desk back at HQ.
Ugh, I have been getting tired of my current project and had started thinking of getting out of freelancing and back into wage employment just for a change of pace. But the more I read, the more I stories I hear from friends and family still in those environments, the more I realize things have only gotten worse. 5 years ago, everyone knew management was lying about the open-floor plan being bad for productivity. Now it sounds like people actually believe the lie and the open-floor plan is no longer reserved for the asshat-MBA-consultoware companies.
Lacking a permanent desk would leave me constantly wondering if my position were also temporary. Even when I worked for a consulting firm who kept me on-site with the client 100% of the time, I had a permanent desk back at HQ.
Ugh, I have been getting tired of my current project and had started thinking of getting out of freelancing and back into wage employment just for a change of pace. But the more I read, the more I stories I hear from friends and family still in those environments, the more I realize things have only gotten worse. 5 years ago, everyone knew management was lying about the open-floor plan being bad for productivity. Now it sounds like people actually believe the lie and the open-floor plan is no longer reserved for the asshat-MBA-consultoware companies.
Partitioned off open workspaces please. NOT the wide open "everyone is equal" cafeteria setup where every single noise/movement distracts each person.
Open offices are about cost saving in facility costs...which is generally a stupid way to do it. Your employees (and the work they produce) is far more important and expensive to your business.
Most places are organized into small teams, small team rooms work the best. Have a few isolation rooms for people who need intense focus and conference rooms for cross-team communication.
It's a formula that works and works well. The team can set the room rules and culture, people can still get stuff done and cross-communication is perfectly available.
Nobody needs to be trying to get work done in the equivalent of the floor of a busy warehouse.
Most places are organized into small teams, small team rooms work the best. Have a few isolation rooms for people who need intense focus and conference rooms for cross-team communication.
It's a formula that works and works well. The team can set the room rules and culture, people can still get stuff done and cross-communication is perfectly available.
Nobody needs to be trying to get work done in the equivalent of the floor of a busy warehouse.
yep the facilities manager get a bonus for saving a few grand at the cost of pissing of your key player.
Unfortunately some of the tail functions of a business have to much power and only pursue their own empire building and the hell with the effect on the other stake holders and indirectly the share price.
Unfortunately some of the tail functions of a business have to much power and only pursue their own empire building and the hell with the effect on the other stake holders and indirectly the share price.
Cubes? Such luxury! I'm hard pressed to find software dev jobs that aren't fully open office these days.
Yep. I rewatched Office Space recently and found myself envious of their working conditions (!). That's what 5 years of open plan does to you
I just replayed Space Quest 3. In the game, Roger Wilco visits ScumSoft, a dystopian software company. Check out the ScumSoft office layouts:
http://www.hardcoregaming101.net/spacequest/sq3-15.png
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Bp3Emd3jJVo/T7wcdqFTM_I/AAAAAAAAAu...
The layout is nice, notwithstanding the whipping.
http://www.hardcoregaming101.net/spacequest/sq3-15.png
http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Bp3Emd3jJVo/T7wcdqFTM_I/AAAAAAAAAu...
The layout is nice, notwithstanding the whipping.
Honestly I'd take the whipping to have full-height cubes like that.
My office is half-height cubes, but apparently there's a redesign in the works that's going to give us "friendly clusters with low partitions" (kill me now).
My office is half-height cubes, but apparently there's a redesign in the works that's going to give us "friendly clusters with low partitions" (kill me now).
I'm pretty sure I've slightly damaged my hearing from long-term headphone use during the years I was stuck in noisy, distracting work environments. Now that I work for myself from home, I mostly don't listen to music at all.
An interesting development of open floor plans is the addition of white noise to reduce distraction. Has anyone seen this used at their office?
>>sound is controlled with dividing walls and “pink noise”—white noise focused on the frequencies of human speech, which can reduce the distance at which a conversation is audible from 50 feet to 12-16 feet. The result, the firm says, is greater focus, accuracy and short-term memory.
>>sound is controlled with dividing walls and “pink noise”—white noise focused on the frequencies of human speech, which can reduce the distance at which a conversation is audible from 50 feet to 12-16 feet. The result, the firm says, is greater focus, accuracy and short-term memory.
I worked for about 6 months before one day there was an emergency announcement over the PA. Before the voice actually came on, the white noise generator cut out and it was weird. I had always assumed it was a noisy air duct.
What you trade off is absolute sound level for attenuating speech like noises faster than they would naturally. So going from nothing to white noise is going to sound and feel noisier. But you will find that you can't hear people talking across the room as well as you could when it was quieter.
I consider it a net positive. But then again I also wear headphones frequently to listen to music for focus (and to drown out everything).
What you trade off is absolute sound level for attenuating speech like noises faster than they would naturally. So going from nothing to white noise is going to sound and feel noisier. But you will find that you can't hear people talking across the room as well as you could when it was quieter.
I consider it a net positive. But then again I also wear headphones frequently to listen to music for focus (and to drown out everything).
Well, I tried it just now from my computer ... e.g. playnoise.com or https://github.com/PatrickStankard/ShutUpAndJam.js
It sounded like a nicer "fan" ... very consistent. I think for it to be effective, you'd want to direct it to bounce off cube or glass walls between you and the speaker. If it's loud enough, without walls, it might prevent conversation, hindering productivity for co-workers.
It sounded like a nicer "fan" ... very consistent. I think for it to be effective, you'd want to direct it to bounce off cube or glass walls between you and the speaker. If it's loud enough, without walls, it might prevent conversation, hindering productivity for co-workers.
We tried them where I work. Our office is probably a 75 person open office. No one liked them (I believe we tried two vendors, not sure which). I felt that they were a little too intrusive -- when it was quiet you still wanted to put your headphones on.
[deleted]
It looks rather like a fancy hotel: open-plan but with desks set in friendly clusters and separated by low, clear partitions.
The company I work for uses a design like this now, albeit the partitions are solid (but still low), and with the 120 degree angles between them apparently favoured by Robert Propst originally. It's known as the "snowflake" design because of the way the clusters with their 120-degree angles look from above.
The company I work for uses a design like this now, albeit the partitions are solid (but still low), and with the 120 degree angles between them apparently favoured by Robert Propst originally. It's known as the "snowflake" design because of the way the clusters with their 120-degree angles look from above.
[deleted]
That's not breaking free, it's simply getting a "bigger cage".
My first programming job in a cube was right between accounting and customer service.
After 6 months they expanded accounting and so moved me to the other side of the building, but next to sales.
After a couple days I started missing customer service.
After 6 months they expanded accounting and so moved me to the other side of the building, but next to sales.
After a couple days I started missing customer service.
I worked in a cubicle (with a window) for a few years.
When given the choice of an office, I stuck to my desk and pulled down the wall between myself and the other developer so we can chat easier.
I now have a standing/sitting desk that I switch between, depending on the work I'm doing. Standing also makes it easier to spot others coming over to ask questions.
This may be due to the environment. Fewer people in the office (<10) and a manager that doesn't care when he sees me on Hacker News.
I now have a standing/sitting desk that I switch between, depending on the work I'm doing. Standing also makes it easier to spot others coming over to ask questions.
This may be due to the environment. Fewer people in the office (<10) and a manager that doesn't care when he sees me on Hacker News.
Settle for nothing less than individual offices. If I don't get an office, I work from home.
A tad biased. Light and fresh air can't penetrate cubes but germs and noise get in with no problem.