5 ms·

The power differential implicit in the voice of managers. The competitive aspect of operating alongside co-workers. The fairness of slacking off, letting one'

The power differential implicit in the voice of managers. The competitive aspect of operating alongside co-workers. The fairness of slacking off, letting one's mind wander, contemplating a hard problem while staring off into space and refraining from typing at a keyboard, maybe running late in the mornings, versus doing "real" work, ass in chair, on time, contributing ideas in meetings and phone calls, producing visible progress... Whether or not people (who can affect your ability to put a roof over your head) ARE NOTICING YOUR EVERY MOVE. This is what an open office is does to me. The anxiety induced by others, and their potential for influencing where the rubber meets the road.

ufmace 9y ago
I'm pretty sure that much anxiety isn't normal or healthy. I hope you can find some help for it.
- electrichead 9y ago
  I think that sometimes depends on the work culture rather than a person's personality. I've worked at places where managers do monitor your every move, look at how long you take at lunch, etc. Also co-workers sometimes think unfavourably of you if they think you are not pulling your weight even if you spend more time thinking than coding. Let's not jump to conclusions.
- megaman22 9y ago
  This is perfectly normal if you're in a toxic micromanaging environment. The open office is the panopticon.
- antris 9y ago
  I have this. It got so bad I had to quit work two years ago. After medication and therapy, I still can't work without getting panic attacks. I'm really frustrated and don't know what to do..
  - trhway 9y ago
    come work to BigCo (not FB nor AMZN though) where people are more diverse by age, not just a bunch of youngsters (who have nothing except the work and who is able to sit staring into monitor for 12 hours straight and have that collective herd - "team" - mentality that everybody should behave the same, "pull their weight", etc. - was myself that way just 15 years ago) In an age diverse environment people have children, lives, businesses, habits, and don't care that much about their own or your job, etc. There is no way the manager (who has all that himself) can make those people work even 8 hours in the office. In official language it is called life-work balance :) Also, (IANAL nor MD) i think at any workplace you can ask for a reasonable accommodation if you have that medical paperwork stating that open office causes anxiety to the level of disability. Even without paperwork i think you can just ask for it at many places. For example, we have a cluster of several cubicles on one end of our floor, and some of them are permanently assigned to some employees (I got offered one too because i was b!tching too much and loud about our open office - i declined in order to avoid getting too comfortable and losing that minimal drive that i still have to change the job :)
    - hiram112 9y ago
      Agreed - recently quit a job at a SV type company where the average age was late 20's, single with no kids, in an open office. In my 30's and also child-free and unmarried, I wasn't unnecessarily out of place, but the fact that everyone seemed to feel that work was equal to life, and everyone had something to prove by how long they could stay late or work on weekends, encouraged by the management (who had nice big offices, btw), left me feeling like I couldn't ever escape being on the clock. I went back to my contracting job in an industry that is truly diverse - not just a few token 28 year old women team leads or POC, but actual diversity: middle aged men and women with kids, older devs in their 60s nearing retirement, naturalized citizens from all over the world (instead of the few big countries supplying H1Bs). It's a much better environment. I'm happy to cover for my 45 year old coworker when she picks up the kids, and she does the same when I need to 'clear my head' by working at Starbucks for the afternoon. We don't stay late and play XBox or have happy hours, and that is fine with me. We're a good team during the day, and content to socialize a few times a year at the holiday party or few other office events.
- gebeeson 9y ago
  That open office anxiety isn't necessarily easily seen or obvious constantly. It can be very subtle and blends in to the background noise. I've gotten used to it over the years but I know it is still there. 'Comes with the territory' is how I'd describe it. My trick is to 'rise above it' so to speak. Tread water harder and try and keep more of my body out of it. Almost always easier said than done.
- anon_d 9y ago
  I don't see how what he's describing needs to interpreted as a lot of anxiety. He's just strongly pointing at the source of the anxiety. I think the GP's comment is dead on.
scruple 9y ago
The year and a half or so that I spent in a bullpen style open-office made me feel like I was an inmate in a panopticon style environment. I could constantly feel managements eyes on the back of my head even though I knew it wasn't literally happening. It was miserable, I'm glad that I got away from it and I will hopefully never find my way there again.
- howard941 9y ago
  It's that feeling of being watched - yes. I can't quantify it but since I've been accidentally promoted into an office (only managers are supposed to have offices in this company but my department's been budded off from the mothership) from the bullpen I feel more productive, stay later each day, and generally feel more confident and at peace all day long. One of my cow-workers who's still under the all seeing eye has a mirror on the aisle-facing wall of his cube. That would probably help had I tried it. My old cube was not only on the middle aisle but had one of those smokey camera housings mounted on the ceiling allegedly facing the door to the outside.
  - thatcat 9y ago
    >one of those smokey camera housings Sometimes these are empty, designed to create the appearance of an all seeing eye without having the overhead of storing data, wiring, etc.
- Ascetik 9y ago
  >The year and a half or so that I spent in a bullpen style open-office made me feel like I was an inmate in a panopticon style environment. I would have replaced 'environment' with "prison" for literary effect. But well said nonetheless. Spot on. I am in a panopticon open-office currently and it is really bad. People shooting nerf darts all the time (one hit me in the eye when I stood up, luckily I wear glasses). People are exceptionally loud. Yesterday the guy in the half-cube next to me was blasting reggae music for 3 hours even after I said "no one wants to hear that". Last Friday our dispatch manager was walking around all the cubes for 2 hours talking as loud as she could because she just got back from vacation. So I told her "Can you stop talking so loudly? I can't concentrate on my work." Her response: "You just started here what 2 weeks ago?" As if that somehow justified being a huge distraction, ok, I am the bad guy cause I don't want to hear you basically shout for hours on end, sure. Then I got asked by my boss if I said all the women in the office are loud. Then I overheard her complaining to another manager, about being told she was being too loud (talking loudly so everyone in the office can hear). They were essentially indirectly taking a jab at me. It is just petty office garbage and totally unprofessional. I have already started looking at other companies and I've only been here 3 weeks.
tapanjk 9y ago
> Whether or not people (who can affect your ability to put a roof over your head) ARE NOTICING YOUR EVERY MOVE. I think what matters is whether I think I am being watched by my coworkers (superiors or otherwise). This uses up some part of my brain that needs to focus on my "visual performance" and thus creates stress. But when I do not think I am watched, my creativity goes up and stress drops. For example, I contribute much better in an audio conference or Slack (just text) meetings, than in a video conference or a face to face meeting. In the former case, I am more relaxed and am able to focus on the problem being discussed and in the latter case, not so much. This might be specific to certain personality types but is true for me for sure.
- hackinthebochs 9y ago
  Absolutely. Being social creatures means we are always at least somewhat aware of how we're presenting ourselves to others. If there are other people in the room (even moreso when those people "matter" in some way), some portion of our cognitive power is attending to this process.
- murph-almighty 9y ago
  > For example, I contribute much better in an audio conference or Slack (just text) meetings, than in a video conference or a face to face meeting. In the former case, I am more relaxed and am able to focus on the problem being discussed and in the latter case, not so much. This might be specific to certain personality types but is true for me for sure. I work remote from my team and thus far I've found that being in person forces me to focus and contribute more, and that I tend to slack off on audio conferences. Different strokes for different folks?
southphillyman 9y ago
I can probably count on my hands the amount of times I browsed HN/non work related sites when I worked in an open office environment. Much like Agile, it's an effective tool to micro manage white collar workers.
- emidln 9y ago
  I quit a job where a manager kept bringing up my web browsing during "office hours". During a conversation, my manager was more concerned about appearance of working than my steadfast project delivery and meeting attendance. Places like that can find other warm bodies and I can find places to pay me.
  - southphillyman 9y ago
    Interesting. The manager at my open office position brought up how I didn't get up and talk to other team members enough. So I made an effort to have casual conversation with others during the day.....and got criticized for talking too much in my next one on one. That was likely just bad mentoring but it opened my eyes as to how someone across a large room, ironically in an office, was presumably able to monitor my activity from afar all day long.
- firepoet 9y ago
  Yikes! As an Agile Coach, I'm sad to hear this. Though I can imagine where the perception comes from. Weaponized Agile is a real problem, one that I combat actively, but it's quite hard to convince leaders that self-management is the goal, not micro-management!
- trhway 9y ago
  Expense on company dime monitor privacy screens. Helps with another open office issue too - sunlight hitting the monitor.
briholt 9y ago
> Whether or not people ARE NOTICING YOUR EVERY MOVE. Yeah, for me the feeling of being implicitly watched and judged all day causes low-level anxiety.
- stefantheard 9y ago
  And it's an aggregating effect. I did not realize this was a problem until 4-5 months into my first job in an open office. It takes a toll on productivity for sure. I notice I work way more relaxed and get more done when the people near me are out of the office or if I work from home.
Z1515M8147 9y ago
I am the only person with a standing desk in an open style office layout of a few dozen people, and i can tell you that this anxiety is increased by several orders of magnitude when everyone else in the room sitting down can see what you are working on at a glance.
- kamaal 9y ago
  Its actually the other way around. Since you are standing, its easier for you to look at them. Its very likely most of your colleagues find that creepy.

ufmace 9y ago

I'm pretty sure that much anxiety isn't normal or healthy. I hope you can find some help for it.

electrichead 9y ago
I think that sometimes depends on the work culture rather than a person's personality. I've worked at places where managers do monitor your every move, look at how long you take at lunch, etc. Also co-workers sometimes think unfavourably of you if they think you are not pulling your weight even if you spend more time thinking than coding. Let's not jump to conclusions.
megaman22 9y ago
This is perfectly normal if you're in a toxic micromanaging environment. The open office is the panopticon.
antris 9y ago
I have this. It got so bad I had to quit work two years ago. After medication and therapy, I still can't work without getting panic attacks. I'm really frustrated and don't know what to do..
- trhway 9y ago
  come work to BigCo (not FB nor AMZN though) where people are more diverse by age, not just a bunch of youngsters (who have nothing except the work and who is able to sit staring into monitor for 12 hours straight and have that collective herd - "team" - mentality that everybody should behave the same, "pull their weight", etc. - was myself that way just 15 years ago) In an age diverse environment people have children, lives, businesses, habits, and don't care that much about their own or your job, etc. There is no way the manager (who has all that himself) can make those people work even 8 hours in the office. In official language it is called life-work balance :) Also, (IANAL nor MD) i think at any workplace you can ask for a reasonable accommodation if you have that medical paperwork stating that open office causes anxiety to the level of disability. Even without paperwork i think you can just ask for it at many places. For example, we have a cluster of several cubicles on one end of our floor, and some of them are permanently assigned to some employees (I got offered one too because i was b!tching too much and loud about our open office - i declined in order to avoid getting too comfortable and losing that minimal drive that i still have to change the job :)
  - hiram112 9y ago
    Agreed - recently quit a job at a SV type company where the average age was late 20's, single with no kids, in an open office. In my 30's and also child-free and unmarried, I wasn't unnecessarily out of place, but the fact that everyone seemed to feel that work was equal to life, and everyone had something to prove by how long they could stay late or work on weekends, encouraged by the management (who had nice big offices, btw), left me feeling like I couldn't ever escape being on the clock. I went back to my contracting job in an industry that is truly diverse - not just a few token 28 year old women team leads or POC, but actual diversity: middle aged men and women with kids, older devs in their 60s nearing retirement, naturalized citizens from all over the world (instead of the few big countries supplying H1Bs). It's a much better environment. I'm happy to cover for my 45 year old coworker when she picks up the kids, and she does the same when I need to 'clear my head' by working at Starbucks for the afternoon. We don't stay late and play XBox or have happy hours, and that is fine with me. We're a good team during the day, and content to socialize a few times a year at the holiday party or few other office events.
gebeeson 9y ago
That open office anxiety isn't necessarily easily seen or obvious constantly. It can be very subtle and blends in to the background noise. I've gotten used to it over the years but I know it is still there. 'Comes with the territory' is how I'd describe it. My trick is to 'rise above it' so to speak. Tread water harder and try and keep more of my body out of it. Almost always easier said than done.
anon_d 9y ago
I don't see how what he's describing needs to interpreted as a lot of anxiety. He's just strongly pointing at the source of the anxiety. I think the GP's comment is dead on.

scruple 9y ago

The year and a half or so that I spent in a bullpen style open-office made me feel like I was an inmate in a panopticon style environment. I could constantly feel managements eyes on the back of my head even though I knew it wasn't literally happening. It was miserable, I'm glad that I got away from it and I will hopefully never find my way there again.

howard941 9y ago
It's that feeling of being watched - yes. I can't quantify it but since I've been accidentally promoted into an office (only managers are supposed to have offices in this company but my department's been budded off from the mothership) from the bullpen I feel more productive, stay later each day, and generally feel more confident and at peace all day long. One of my cow-workers who's still under the all seeing eye has a mirror on the aisle-facing wall of his cube. That would probably help had I tried it. My old cube was not only on the middle aisle but had one of those smokey camera housings mounted on the ceiling allegedly facing the door to the outside.
- thatcat 9y ago
  >one of those smokey camera housings Sometimes these are empty, designed to create the appearance of an all seeing eye without having the overhead of storing data, wiring, etc.
Ascetik 9y ago
>The year and a half or so that I spent in a bullpen style open-office made me feel like I was an inmate in a panopticon style environment. I would have replaced 'environment' with "prison" for literary effect. But well said nonetheless. Spot on. I am in a panopticon open-office currently and it is really bad. People shooting nerf darts all the time (one hit me in the eye when I stood up, luckily I wear glasses). People are exceptionally loud. Yesterday the guy in the half-cube next to me was blasting reggae music for 3 hours even after I said "no one wants to hear that". Last Friday our dispatch manager was walking around all the cubes for 2 hours talking as loud as she could because she just got back from vacation. So I told her "Can you stop talking so loudly? I can't concentrate on my work." Her response: "You just started here what 2 weeks ago?" As if that somehow justified being a huge distraction, ok, I am the bad guy cause I don't want to hear you basically shout for hours on end, sure. Then I got asked by my boss if I said all the women in the office are loud. Then I overheard her complaining to another manager, about being told she was being too loud (talking loudly so everyone in the office can hear). They were essentially indirectly taking a jab at me. It is just petty office garbage and totally unprofessional. I have already started looking at other companies and I've only been here 3 weeks.

tapanjk 9y ago

> Whether or not people (who can affect your ability to put a roof over your head) ARE NOTICING YOUR EVERY MOVE. I think what matters is whether I think I am being watched by my coworkers (superiors or otherwise). This uses up some part of my brain that needs to focus on my "visual performance" and thus creates stress. But when I do not think I am watched, my creativity goes up and stress drops. For example, I contribute much better in an audio conference or Slack (just text) meetings, than in a video conference or a face to face meeting. In the former case, I am more relaxed and am able to focus on the problem being discussed and in the latter case, not so much. This might be specific to certain personality types but is true for me for sure.

hackinthebochs 9y ago
Absolutely. Being social creatures means we are always at least somewhat aware of how we're presenting ourselves to others. If there are other people in the room (even moreso when those people "matter" in some way), some portion of our cognitive power is attending to this process.
murph-almighty 9y ago
> For example, I contribute much better in an audio conference or Slack (just text) meetings, than in a video conference or a face to face meeting. In the former case, I am more relaxed and am able to focus on the problem being discussed and in the latter case, not so much. This might be specific to certain personality types but is true for me for sure. I work remote from my team and thus far I've found that being in person forces me to focus and contribute more, and that I tend to slack off on audio conferences. Different strokes for different folks?

southphillyman 9y ago

I can probably count on my hands the amount of times I browsed HN/non work related sites when I worked in an open office environment. Much like Agile, it's an effective tool to micro manage white collar workers.

emidln 9y ago
I quit a job where a manager kept bringing up my web browsing during "office hours". During a conversation, my manager was more concerned about appearance of working than my steadfast project delivery and meeting attendance. Places like that can find other warm bodies and I can find places to pay me.
- southphillyman 9y ago
  Interesting. The manager at my open office position brought up how I didn't get up and talk to other team members enough. So I made an effort to have casual conversation with others during the day.....and got criticized for talking too much in my next one on one. That was likely just bad mentoring but it opened my eyes as to how someone across a large room, ironically in an office, was presumably able to monitor my activity from afar all day long.
firepoet 9y ago
Yikes! As an Agile Coach, I'm sad to hear this. Though I can imagine where the perception comes from. Weaponized Agile is a real problem, one that I combat actively, but it's quite hard to convince leaders that self-management is the goal, not micro-management!
trhway 9y ago
Expense on company dime monitor privacy screens. Helps with another open office issue too - sunlight hitting the monitor.

briholt 9y ago

> Whether or not people ARE NOTICING YOUR EVERY MOVE. Yeah, for me the feeling of being implicitly watched and judged all day causes low-level anxiety.

stefantheard 9y ago
And it's an aggregating effect. I did not realize this was a problem until 4-5 months into my first job in an open office. It takes a toll on productivity for sure. I notice I work way more relaxed and get more done when the people near me are out of the office or if I work from home.

Z1515M8147 9y ago

I am the only person with a standing desk in an open style office layout of a few dozen people, and i can tell you that this anxiety is increased by several orders of magnitude when everyone else in the room sitting down can see what you are working on at a glance.

kamaal 9y ago
Its actually the other way around. Since you are standing, its easier for you to look at them. Its very likely most of your colleagues find that creepy.