7 ms·

When I read this article, I could replace the name of "Evan Spiegel" with almost any other Silicon Valley executive and get the same result: > While other Snap

When I read this article, I could replace the name of "Evan Spiegel" with almost any other Silicon Valley executive and get the same result: > While other Snap employees and executives sit next to each other in an open floor plan, Spiegel’s office towers over the building's old lobby at the top of a flight of stairs. The door to the office is locked and protected by a special keypad." In every company I've been in that uses open offices, the executives get closed door offices. > To the group’s surprise, the meeting was in the security room, where Snap's security guards are stationed, according to one person familiar with the matter. Isn't this a matter of safety? I remember this historical story at one large company I worked at: after a layoff, the employee returned to his manager's office with a gun. Thankfully, the situation was defused. > Beyond vague statements like “building the world’s best camera” and making “communication more real and authentic,” there’s little-to-no communication inside Snap about what’s in the pipeline. Just about every company... > “There were times when we would do PowerPoint presentations, and you literally would spend 50% of the time formatting it,” one of the former executives Business Insider spoke to recounted. “What shade of yellow, that sort of thing.” Just like any big company! I have nothing for or against Snapchat. It reads like a poorly crafted hit piece against the CEO.

carlosdp 10y ago
At most companies I've worked for, the CEO didn't even really have a desk because they never used it anyways. They're always in meetings or out of office, so they had a regular old desk assigned to them, but it was usually empty. (and they were all open plan) But I agree with your assessment.
- BinaryIdiot 10y ago
  Seems every company handles this different. When I had an internship at Polk Audio I was warned not to go near the executive offices nor to make eye contact with Matt Polk. Initially I thought people were joking but when I walked near the executive offices one time I thought the secretary was going to have a seizure. (Note this was before they sold the company; I'd imagine it's different now with a different executive team)
- aetherson 10y ago
  My current employer (Life360) and former employer (Flywheel) both had the CEO and all other executives working at desks in the open floorplans. I think that there comes a size of company where that gets impractical, and Snap is probably at least that size. But it's by no means crazy for execs to work in the open floorplan.
  - tedmiston 10y ago
    According to a LinkedIn query, admittedly a coarse metric for current headcount, Snapchat has 1290 current employees (includes founders, etc as well) [1]. Crunchbase says 101–250. They seem to have somewhat intentionally disappeared off of AngelList with just 3 employees listed. Edit: LinkedIn is not too far off from what's mentioned in the article: > The top-secret Snap Labs group overseeing the Spectacles is such a priority that the group earlier this year set a goal of hiring 200 people in just sixty days, according to the staffer who left. The hiring plan was especially aggressive for a company whose total headcount is just above 1,000 employees. [1]: https://www.linkedin.com/vsearch/p?f_CC=3186630&trk=rr_connectedness https://www.linkedin.com/vsearch/p?f_CC=3186630&trk=rr_conne...
BinaryIdiot 10y ago
> In every company I've been in that uses open offices, the executives get closed door offices. Same here though it's interesting that it's in a separate space that is above the rest of the space at Snap. But they're probably just using whatever space was there. > Just about every company... Are you sure? Every company I've been apart of, even large companies, I usually know some of what's coming down the pipe. I usually know enough details about future developments to know that, when I make a decision development wise, I can be sure it'll continue to work when products X, Y and Z ship. Though to be fair after a certain size it's just not feasible to know of all upcoming products. I'm curious if there are any statistics available regarding employees in tech companies and their knowledge of upcoming products.
thinkmassive 10y ago
For the most part it does seem similar to many tech startups, especially in California. I think the point the author was trying to make about the CEO's office was that Spiegel's is at the top of its own stairway, literally looking down on the lobby and towering over everyone else. On the other hand their offices are scattered among many buildings around town, so it's probably not as menacing as the description makes it sound.
rhizome 10y ago
OT, but it's more readable if you add your own carriage returns.
tomdell 10y ago
Really? The piece seemed to have a fairly balanced mix of praise and criticism. "Hit pieces" don't usually praise the vision of the person they're profiling.
fullshark 10y ago
I didn't get the sense it was a hit piece really, just seemed informative to me. The only employees who are going to give interviews I guess have a negative slant though and that shines through.
gumby 10y ago
> In every company I've been in that uses open offices, the executives get closed door offices. That's a relic of the past! Silicon Valley has almost entirely embraced the HP culture where even the CEOs are in cubicles or open desks just like everyone else. Though it is true that some conference rooms seem perpetually unbookable... (This was true of Hewlett and Packard as well -- they had cubicles like everyone else, but they also had dedicated "meeting rooms" which are still preserved today, not the HP really survives...). BTW I agree with your assessment: "reads like a poorly crafted hit piece against the CEO."
- user5994461 10y ago
  If companies had team offices, they wouldn't need that many conference rooms.
  - gumby 10y ago
    Does "team office" mean open plan? The point is that the execs monopolize conference rooms so they have a quiet place to work. Seems like nobody connects the dots that developers need a distraction free place to work as well.
    - user5994461 10y ago
      team office = an office sized for a team (typically 3 to 8 people).
popcorncolonel 10y ago
At Yelp everyone including CEO, CTO, etc works at an open desk. Even his dog.
- gtaylor 10y ago
  Same for us at Reddit. Howdy, neighbor!
- sammydavis 10y ago
  Yeah, but how much work can you get out of a dog, even in a private office.
devy 10y ago
> When I read this article, I could replace the name of "Evan Spiegel" with almost any other Silicon Valley executive and get the same result No. Mark Zuckerberg does not have a "office towers over the building's old lobby at the top of the flight of stairs". At least not in 2015.[1] [1]: http://www.businessinsider.com/mark-zuckerberg-virtual-tour-frank-gehry-designed-building-2015-9 http://www.businessinsider.com/mark-zuckerberg-virtual-tour-...
- evanelias 10y ago
  That's true, and he's very frequently seen on the Menlo Park campus. But on the other hand, I worked from FB's NYC office for two years, and Zuckerberg did not visit the office even one single time during that period. Or at least, if he did visit, it certainly wasn't publicized, nor was it something that employees could attend. And that's despite the NYC office being the company's 3rd-largest (by headcount), and despite Zuck making a few publicized appearances at other third-party events in NYC. (Also his sister lives here, and his parents are just north of the city...) Personally I found it demoralizing, but I know others who didn't really care.
- dharmon 10y ago
  Zuckerberg has a conference room that is indefinitely reserved for his use. So ostensibly he has a desk like everyone else, but practically speaking he has a private office that he spends all his time in. If you walk through campus it's the room with the "don't take pictures of the animals" sign on it.
nine_k 10y ago
In at least one startup I worked for, the founder sat in the same open office as everyone else (except the sales team that had a sound-insulated room). The company was about 50 people, though, about an order of magnitude smaller than Snapchat.

carlosdp 10y ago

At most companies I've worked for, the CEO didn't even really have a desk because they never used it anyways. They're always in meetings or out of office, so they had a regular old desk assigned to them, but it was usually empty. (and they were all open plan) But I agree with your assessment.

BinaryIdiot 10y ago
Seems every company handles this different. When I had an internship at Polk Audio I was warned not to go near the executive offices nor to make eye contact with Matt Polk. Initially I thought people were joking but when I walked near the executive offices one time I thought the secretary was going to have a seizure. (Note this was before they sold the company; I'd imagine it's different now with a different executive team)
aetherson 10y ago
My current employer (Life360) and former employer (Flywheel) both had the CEO and all other executives working at desks in the open floorplans. I think that there comes a size of company where that gets impractical, and Snap is probably at least that size. But it's by no means crazy for execs to work in the open floorplan.
- tedmiston 10y ago
  According to a LinkedIn query, admittedly a coarse metric for current headcount, Snapchat has 1290 current employees (includes founders, etc as well) [1]. Crunchbase says 101–250. They seem to have somewhat intentionally disappeared off of AngelList with just 3 employees listed. Edit: LinkedIn is not too far off from what's mentioned in the article: > The top-secret Snap Labs group overseeing the Spectacles is such a priority that the group earlier this year set a goal of hiring 200 people in just sixty days, according to the staffer who left. The hiring plan was especially aggressive for a company whose total headcount is just above 1,000 employees. [1]: https://www.linkedin.com/vsearch/p?f_CC=3186630&trk=rr_connectedness https://www.linkedin.com/vsearch/p?f_CC=3186630&trk=rr_conne...

BinaryIdiot 10y ago

> In every company I've been in that uses open offices, the executives get closed door offices. Same here though it's interesting that it's in a separate space that is above the rest of the space at Snap. But they're probably just using whatever space was there. > Just about every company... Are you sure? Every company I've been apart of, even large companies, I usually know some of what's coming down the pipe. I usually know enough details about future developments to know that, when I make a decision development wise, I can be sure it'll continue to work when products X, Y and Z ship. Though to be fair after a certain size it's just not feasible to know of all upcoming products. I'm curious if there are any statistics available regarding employees in tech companies and their knowledge of upcoming products.

thinkmassive 10y ago

For the most part it does seem similar to many tech startups, especially in California. I think the point the author was trying to make about the CEO's office was that Spiegel's is at the top of its own stairway, literally looking down on the lobby and towering over everyone else. On the other hand their offices are scattered among many buildings around town, so it's probably not as menacing as the description makes it sound.

rhizome 10y ago

OT, but it's more readable if you add your own carriage returns.

tomdell 10y ago

Really? The piece seemed to have a fairly balanced mix of praise and criticism. "Hit pieces" don't usually praise the vision of the person they're profiling.

fullshark 10y ago

I didn't get the sense it was a hit piece really, just seemed informative to me. The only employees who are going to give interviews I guess have a negative slant though and that shines through.

gumby 10y ago

> In every company I've been in that uses open offices, the executives get closed door offices. That's a relic of the past! Silicon Valley has almost entirely embraced the HP culture where even the CEOs are in cubicles or open desks just like everyone else. Though it is true that some conference rooms seem perpetually unbookable... (This was true of Hewlett and Packard as well -- they had cubicles like everyone else, but they also had dedicated "meeting rooms" which are still preserved today, not the HP really survives...). BTW I agree with your assessment: "reads like a poorly crafted hit piece against the CEO."

user5994461 10y ago
If companies had team offices, they wouldn't need that many conference rooms.
- gumby 10y ago
  Does "team office" mean open plan? The point is that the execs monopolize conference rooms so they have a quiet place to work. Seems like nobody connects the dots that developers need a distraction free place to work as well.
  - user5994461 10y ago
    team office = an office sized for a team (typically 3 to 8 people).

popcorncolonel 10y ago

At Yelp everyone including CEO, CTO, etc works at an open desk. Even his dog.

gtaylor 10y ago
Same for us at Reddit. Howdy, neighbor!
sammydavis 10y ago
Yeah, but how much work can you get out of a dog, even in a private office.

devy 10y ago

> When I read this article, I could replace the name of "Evan Spiegel" with almost any other Silicon Valley executive and get the same result No. Mark Zuckerberg does not have a "office towers over the building's old lobby at the top of the flight of stairs". At least not in 2015.[1] [1]: http://www.businessinsider.com/mark-zuckerberg-virtual-tour-frank-gehry-designed-building-2015-9 http://www.businessinsider.com/mark-zuckerberg-virtual-tour-...

evanelias 10y ago
That's true, and he's very frequently seen on the Menlo Park campus. But on the other hand, I worked from FB's NYC office for two years, and Zuckerberg did not visit the office even one single time during that period. Or at least, if he did visit, it certainly wasn't publicized, nor was it something that employees could attend. And that's despite the NYC office being the company's 3rd-largest (by headcount), and despite Zuck making a few publicized appearances at other third-party events in NYC. (Also his sister lives here, and his parents are just north of the city...) Personally I found it demoralizing, but I know others who didn't really care.
dharmon 10y ago
Zuckerberg has a conference room that is indefinitely reserved for his use. So ostensibly he has a desk like everyone else, but practically speaking he has a private office that he spends all his time in. If you walk through campus it's the room with the "don't take pictures of the animals" sign on it.

nine_k 10y ago

In at least one startup I worked for, the founder sat in the same open office as everyone else (except the sales team that had a sound-insulated room). The company was about 50 people, though, about an order of magnitude smaller than Snapchat.