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I think you missed the point. It's not about headphones, it's about needing headphones to block disruption. If you need something like that then it's a poor off

I think you missed the point. It's not about headphones, it's about needing headphones to block disruption. If you need something like that then it's a poor office design. > I feel like spontaneous dialog would be cut short by this solution more often than being moved. Good. Spontaneous dialog is far more often disruptive to productivity than it is helpful.

gfodor 9y ago
> Spontaneous dialog is far more often disruptive to productivity than it is helpful. I think this is the crux of where most of these threads end up. Not everyone agrees with both the explicit and implicit premise of this point: - Not everyone agrees that productivity should be the exclusive focus of office design decisions - Not everyone agrees that spontaneous discussions should not be embraced as a core mechanism of enhancing team-wide productivity
- pseudalopex 9y ago
  These discussions focus on productivity because the main arguments in favor of open floor plans are that they're cheaper and supposedly improve team productivity. Studies show that more people prefer offices, and above all people prefer having a choice.
- sotojuan 9y ago
  The problem with the argument for/against "serendipity" is that 95% of these spontaneous conversations are useless and created solely to kill boredom, but the remaining 5% do end up helping out. My dream scenario would be private rooms surrounding a common working area. But the CEOs/MBAs see Facebook brag about their largest open office ever and tell themselves "I wanna be like that!!!" and follow suit.
- valuearb 9y ago
  People who work in open floor plans or individual office plans can have spontaneous discussions. The floor plan doesn't limit that, the open floor plan just makes it easier. But it's impossible to be as productive in an open floor plan as it is in individual offices. So isn't the better choice to have the more productive environment and teach your employees to organize their "spontaneous" conversations better? If I run into the product manager in the hall, or she comes into my office, and we suddenly have this great conversation the team would benefit from, isn't the better choice not tearing down walls but having us slack the team to meet us in my office or the conference room so we can whiteboard it out with everyone's input?

gfodor 9y ago

> Spontaneous dialog is far more often disruptive to productivity than it is helpful. I think this is the crux of where most of these threads end up. Not everyone agrees with both the explicit and implicit premise of this point: - Not everyone agrees that productivity should be the exclusive focus of office design decisions - Not everyone agrees that spontaneous discussions should not be embraced as a core mechanism of enhancing team-wide productivity

pseudalopex 9y ago
These discussions focus on productivity because the main arguments in favor of open floor plans are that they're cheaper and supposedly improve team productivity. Studies show that more people prefer offices, and above all people prefer having a choice.
sotojuan 9y ago
The problem with the argument for/against "serendipity" is that 95% of these spontaneous conversations are useless and created solely to kill boredom, but the remaining 5% do end up helping out. My dream scenario would be private rooms surrounding a common working area. But the CEOs/MBAs see Facebook brag about their largest open office ever and tell themselves "I wanna be like that!!!" and follow suit.
valuearb 9y ago
People who work in open floor plans or individual office plans can have spontaneous discussions. The floor plan doesn't limit that, the open floor plan just makes it easier. But it's impossible to be as productive in an open floor plan as it is in individual offices. So isn't the better choice to have the more productive environment and teach your employees to organize their "spontaneous" conversations better? If I run into the product manager in the hall, or she comes into my office, and we suddenly have this great conversation the team would benefit from, isn't the better choice not tearing down walls but having us slack the team to meet us in my office or the conference room so we can whiteboard it out with everyone's input?