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When I was at Google (Kirkland), the offices were basically open-plan fishbowls. WFH was massively better. I once worked at a startup (pre-covid) that had an
by flax 4y ago
When I was at Google (Kirkland), the offices were basically open-plan fishbowls. WFH was massively better.
I once worked at a startup (pre-covid) that had an open-plan setup with a significant portion of people using standing desks. They provided one stool for 2 standing desks justifying it because "if you use a standing desk you should be standing most of the time".
Pure cheapskate short-sightedness.
- Laaas 4y agoWell, that could be justified as maintaining the health of the employees by forcing one of two to stand up at any time.
- rootusrootus 4y agoIt would have to be timed so each employee got equal stool time. IIRC standing all day isn't necessarily healthier than sitting all day. You want to alternate.
- Laaas 4y agoThat would be incentivised with this system, no? Employees would fight the other off the stool constantly, to get their share of sitting.
- rootusrootus 4y agoAnd perhaps get a little exercise in the process. Good point.
- masklinn 4y agoIt’s not like standing statically is good for your health either, and it can be easy to do that when focusing. I hit that issue when I got my standing desk early during the pandemic, I tend to lock my knees when static and doing that for hours at a time was not good.
- outworlder 4y agoYeah, that's "amazing" for those employees with very common conditions like plantar fasciitis.
- manmal 4y agoI‘m not sure standing 4+ hours a day has been established as healthy without exception. Long sitting is bad, sure; but switching things around ad libitum might be better than enforcing standing all the time.
- philwelch 4y agoHealthy human beings can walk, let alone stand still, for over four hours a day easily.
- manmal 4y agoStanding still is different from walking. It’s not that great really: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00140139.2017.1420825 https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00140139.2017.14... Swelling in lower limbs doesn’t sound good. From an evolutionary POV I can’t really imagine why our bodies should be optimized for standing still.
- philwelch 4y agoSounds like the best option for a standing desk is to add one of those walking treadmills then. For me though, whenever I'm using a standing desk I move around a lot; I almost never stand still.
- jwestbury 4y agoI can walk all day quite happily. Standing still for even an hour is quite uncomfortable, however.
- cududa 4y agoThat's not the employer's purview. They can incentivize health but, seriously F right off with that controlling nonsense. They're employees, not your charges or children.
- ryandrake 4y agoNot that I agree with the practice, but many retail employees (at least in the USA) are required to stand while working, even if the job can easily be done while seated, as is the case for receptionists, fast food and grocery cashiers, and so on. It's definitely within the company's purview, even if the practice is unnecessarily cruel.
- wink 4y agoI think the only cashiers I see standing in Germany are at IKEA and hardware stores (because they have to stand to scan half the huge parts), and even then I think they have a chair inside their little spot next to the scanner and the conveyor belt. Only the "info booth" people are usually standing.
- cududa 4y agoIronic that in the United States, the only cashiers I've ever seen allowed to sit are Aldi employees
- KyeRussell 4y agoYeah. Right. We can add it to the long list of ways that tech bros assert their false sense of transferable expertise onto other people. The average startup…whatever person, has never actually asked an expert if standing desks do much if any good. The truth is way more nuanced.
- GauntletWizard 4y agoI liked the fishbowls, but I had a team whose office was just the right size for it - The glass walls kept out the noise well enough, and the view of the rest of the office didn't bother me. I was for a period in the open plan area without an enclosure - That sucked, modulo the Sennheiser headphones we had provided which I blasted music and white noise in.
- deckard1 4y ago> They provided one stool for 2 standing desks They had it better in the movie Brazil. At least they had offices! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mS5WLkb_Cxk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mS5WLkb_Cxk
- reaperducer 4y agoStanding desks were the only desks that knowledge workers (clerks mostly) had in Dickensian times. Good to see the tech industry bringing us back to the workplace of the 1800's. Up next: Child labor!