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Money. Open offices are cheaper. So if you can con your mostly 20-something and 30-something tech staff that it's the best way to go, then you're golden, you s

Money. Open offices are cheaper. So if you can con your mostly 20-something and 30-something tech staff that it's the best way to go, then you're golden, you save a ton of money and your employees don't even realize they're being ripped off. As for "serendipity" it's the classic post-hoc fallacy problem. People think "oh, there was that one time" where something good happened in an open office, and they think that means nothing good would happen without open offices. Serendipity happens plenty with offices, but it happens amidst a background of much greater productivity and less annoyance at noisy office mates.

nickthemagicman 10y ago
Short term money. If it kills productivity, they lose money in the long run.
- theprotocol 10y ago
  Nearly every company these days falls for this. I suspect suits completely misunderstand the principle of time value of money, as they wrongly conflate "short term money" with "earlier money." And in finance, when it comes to inflows of money, earlier always trumps later (as it's assumed that you can thus will invest that money for longer when you get it earlier).
- InclinedPlane 10y ago
  That's true of a lot of practices, but when the feedback loop isn't as tight, it's easy for companies to ignore it. There are countless examples of big companies hemorrhaging talent because of their corporate culture, policies, etc. I've witnessed it many times with my own eyes. But that sort of thing doesn't manifest as the company burning to the ground in the next year and then people going "why did that happen? oh, it's because we lost Jim". Instead it looks like a failure to execute as well on big projects. But because there are always so many things changing from project to project, it's always easy to blame something else. And the management at most big corporations are loathe to blame themselves or their policies, so they always find some other convenient excuse. This is a big reason why companies change character of time and transition from being industry powerhouses to also-rans.
TeMPOraL 10y ago
People are so in pursuit of the "water cooler serendipity" that they're turning their whole offices into water coolers!
jasonkester 10y ago
your employees don't even realize they're being ripped off. Careful with your terminology there. To be "ripped off" requires there to be no other choice. Your car has broken down in the desert and the single mechanic within 100 miles can charge you what he wants. In that light, it is not possible for an engineer contemplating accepting a job offer from Facebook to be "ripped off". He's in intelligent businessperson negotiating a deal with a ton of other options available. They can't force him to do anything, and if he sees an open plan office as a downside, he can negotiate compensation in other forms. Personally, I'm happy to work in any environment you put me in. Stick me in the swimming pool and feed me margaritas all day if you think it helps your corporate culture. I'll assume you've done the math and factored in the drop in productivity, so I won't feel bad to watch it happen. That's the nice thing about business. You can assume the other side of the table is also behaving rationally, and let him shoot himself in the foot if he pleases.
- thaumasiotes 10y ago
  > Careful with your terminology there. To be "ripped off" requires there to be no other choice. Your car has broken down in the desert and the single mechanic within 100 miles can charge you what he wants. That doesn't reflect any usage of "ripped off" that I've ever heard. If I buy a doodad from one of three sidewalk stalls all next to each other, I pay $40, and any of them would have sold it to me for $5, it would be conventional to say I got ripped off. Or, if I buy a dowsing rod advertised at a nonnegotiable price, it would still be conventional to say I got ripped off, because there's no such thing as a dowsing rod. "Ripped off" means you paid more for something than it was worth. The lone mechanic in the desert isn't doing that; his services really are that valuable.
- xiaoma 10y ago
  >>your employees don't even realize they're being ripped off. >Careful with your terminology there. To be "ripped off" requires... >It is not possible for an engineer contemplating accepting a job offer from Facebook to be "ripped off". He's in intelligent businessperson For someone telling people to be careful with their terminology, the word "businessperson" sure is an odd way to describe a W2 employee taking on a full time job.

nickthemagicman 10y ago

Short term money. If it kills productivity, they lose money in the long run.

theprotocol 10y ago
Nearly every company these days falls for this. I suspect suits completely misunderstand the principle of time value of money, as they wrongly conflate "short term money" with "earlier money." And in finance, when it comes to inflows of money, earlier always trumps later (as it's assumed that you can thus will invest that money for longer when you get it earlier).
InclinedPlane 10y ago
That's true of a lot of practices, but when the feedback loop isn't as tight, it's easy for companies to ignore it. There are countless examples of big companies hemorrhaging talent because of their corporate culture, policies, etc. I've witnessed it many times with my own eyes. But that sort of thing doesn't manifest as the company burning to the ground in the next year and then people going "why did that happen? oh, it's because we lost Jim". Instead it looks like a failure to execute as well on big projects. But because there are always so many things changing from project to project, it's always easy to blame something else. And the management at most big corporations are loathe to blame themselves or their policies, so they always find some other convenient excuse. This is a big reason why companies change character of time and transition from being industry powerhouses to also-rans.

TeMPOraL 10y ago

People are so in pursuit of the "water cooler serendipity" that they're turning their whole offices into water coolers!

jasonkester 10y ago

your employees don't even realize they're being ripped off. Careful with your terminology there. To be "ripped off" requires there to be no other choice. Your car has broken down in the desert and the single mechanic within 100 miles can charge you what he wants. In that light, it is not possible for an engineer contemplating accepting a job offer from Facebook to be "ripped off". He's in intelligent businessperson negotiating a deal with a ton of other options available. They can't force him to do anything, and if he sees an open plan office as a downside, he can negotiate compensation in other forms. Personally, I'm happy to work in any environment you put me in. Stick me in the swimming pool and feed me margaritas all day if you think it helps your corporate culture. I'll assume you've done the math and factored in the drop in productivity, so I won't feel bad to watch it happen. That's the nice thing about business. You can assume the other side of the table is also behaving rationally, and let him shoot himself in the foot if he pleases.

thaumasiotes 10y ago
> Careful with your terminology there. To be "ripped off" requires there to be no other choice. Your car has broken down in the desert and the single mechanic within 100 miles can charge you what he wants. That doesn't reflect any usage of "ripped off" that I've ever heard. If I buy a doodad from one of three sidewalk stalls all next to each other, I pay $40, and any of them would have sold it to me for $5, it would be conventional to say I got ripped off. Or, if I buy a dowsing rod advertised at a nonnegotiable price, it would still be conventional to say I got ripped off, because there's no such thing as a dowsing rod. "Ripped off" means you paid more for something than it was worth. The lone mechanic in the desert isn't doing that; his services really are that valuable.
xiaoma 10y ago
>>your employees don't even realize they're being ripped off. >Careful with your terminology there. To be "ripped off" requires... >It is not possible for an engineer contemplating accepting a job offer from Facebook to be "ripped off". He's in intelligent businessperson For someone telling people to be careful with their terminology, the word "businessperson" sure is an odd way to describe a W2 employee taking on a full time job.