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Remember how all those Gen X movies depicted cubicles as the embodiment of the soul crushing rat race. If only we still had it that good!

by pram 4y ago

shortcake27 4y ago
100% agree. I thought open plan was bad, then the norm became open plan hotdesking (no permanency). Such a morale killer.
toastercat 4y ago
I had low-wall cubicles at one job and thought it was great. Could still see the eyes and noses of my coworkers around me, and it was easy making conversation or asking for help.
- at-fates-hands 4y ago
  I came here to say the same thing. I worked at a company where a smart manager got low profile cubes for the dev team. We were located in an area that had access to a host of large whiteboards, and large monitors for video conferencing. It was really great. If a dev ran into a problem, it was easy to ask for help. Then you could start working at a whiteboard a few feet from your desk. Whether you were working something out alone or with some other dev, chances are within a few minutes several other devs were there working the problem out with you. I mean the collaboration was really cool and we blasted through so many bugs and bad code, it was really refreshing. Likewise, we had a large portion of the floor dedicated to CSR folks. Again, some smart manager got them 7ft. high cubes so the noise the devs were making wouldn't interrupt what they were doing. They even had a few spare CSR cubes for anybody who really wanted to be heads down and working in absolute quiet.
brailsafe 4y ago
Damn idk which I'd rather have. Some cube farms are next-level depressing. When I was younger, I think part of what made the prospect of moving out of my hometown more compelling was the fact that a giant mega-insurance company ended up being the main endpoint for CS grads. I got to visit once and it was _not_ pretty. Tightly enclosed cubes with tall aging white walls, one source of sunlight if that. They must of really liked Java. On the flipside, the last open office I worked did provide me my own desk, but I had to hear everything that was going on around me, and when my manager wanted to micromanage me, he'd just pull up a chair. I could hear people talking, crunching chips, and smell my colleagues disgusting boiled eggs that he ate at his desk multiple times a day.
- hotpotamus 4y ago
  Well if you get a cube by the window, there's always a chance of seeing some merry squirrels.
- octacat 4y ago
  There are so many other options besides a football size open space (hello, facebook) and corpo cubicles. For example, each agile team could perfectly fit in a small room + shared areas. And put a couple extra desks for monads like managers.
- WWLink 4y ago
  Open or not, the important factor is how much free space you have around you. I claim that a crowded cubicle setup will be worse than a spacious open office. Granted, SPACIOUS open offices are really rare - the largest motivator is to crowd as many people in as possible. You know what the icing on the cake is? Open office workspaces are almost always crowded into a building that was made for cubicles or a warehouse or whatever. There's never enough parking, never enough toilets. The asshole business owners always play the "well, we're a growing company so you'll have to live with this for now" card. When the company I work for was new, we had big desks in a huge office space, so we were spread out. It was awesome! Like you easily had 8ft of desk to yourself and a cabinet and lots of space to breathe.
  - outworlder 4y ago
    > Open office workspaces are almost always crowded into a building that was made for cubicles or a warehouse or whatever. Yeah! See, at least with cubes you know exactly where your "space" ends. Not so with many open plan offices, they can always try to cram more.
ChuckNorris89 4y ago
Yeah, at the job I just left we had much less square meter space per employee in our open office than what egg laying chickens are required to have in Europe by law. We literally have it worse than farm animals in some offices.
ryandrake 4y ago
Sam Lowry's office at Information Retrieval[1] was supposed to depict a dystopianly-terrible office setup, but these day's I'd kill for a workspace like that. That's how bad offices are in 2023. 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mS5WLkb_Cxk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mS5WLkb_Cxk

Remember how all those Gen X movies depicted cubicles as the embodiment of the soul crushing rat race. If only we still had it that good!

by pram 4y ago

Remember how all those Gen X movies depicted cubicles as the embodiment of the soul crushing rat race. If only we still had it that good!

shortcake27 4y ago

100% agree. I thought open plan was bad, then the norm became open plan hotdesking (no permanency). Such a morale killer.

toastercat 4y ago

I had low-wall cubicles at one job and thought it was great. Could still see the eyes and noses of my coworkers around me, and it was easy making conversation or asking for help.

at-fates-hands 4y ago
I came here to say the same thing. I worked at a company where a smart manager got low profile cubes for the dev team. We were located in an area that had access to a host of large whiteboards, and large monitors for video conferencing. It was really great. If a dev ran into a problem, it was easy to ask for help. Then you could start working at a whiteboard a few feet from your desk. Whether you were working something out alone or with some other dev, chances are within a few minutes several other devs were there working the problem out with you. I mean the collaboration was really cool and we blasted through so many bugs and bad code, it was really refreshing. Likewise, we had a large portion of the floor dedicated to CSR folks. Again, some smart manager got them 7ft. high cubes so the noise the devs were making wouldn't interrupt what they were doing. They even had a few spare CSR cubes for anybody who really wanted to be heads down and working in absolute quiet.

brailsafe 4y ago

Damn idk which I'd rather have. Some cube farms are next-level depressing. When I was younger, I think part of what made the prospect of moving out of my hometown more compelling was the fact that a giant mega-insurance company ended up being the main endpoint for CS grads. I got to visit once and it was _not_ pretty. Tightly enclosed cubes with tall aging white walls, one source of sunlight if that. They must of really liked Java. On the flipside, the last open office I worked did provide me my own desk, but I had to hear everything that was going on around me, and when my manager wanted to micromanage me, he'd just pull up a chair. I could hear people talking, crunching chips, and smell my colleagues disgusting boiled eggs that he ate at his desk multiple times a day.

hotpotamus 4y ago
Well if you get a cube by the window, there's always a chance of seeing some merry squirrels.
octacat 4y ago
There are so many other options besides a football size open space (hello, facebook) and corpo cubicles. For example, each agile team could perfectly fit in a small room + shared areas. And put a couple extra desks for monads like managers.
WWLink 4y ago
Open or not, the important factor is how much free space you have around you. I claim that a crowded cubicle setup will be worse than a spacious open office. Granted, SPACIOUS open offices are really rare - the largest motivator is to crowd as many people in as possible. You know what the icing on the cake is? Open office workspaces are almost always crowded into a building that was made for cubicles or a warehouse or whatever. There's never enough parking, never enough toilets. The asshole business owners always play the "well, we're a growing company so you'll have to live with this for now" card. When the company I work for was new, we had big desks in a huge office space, so we were spread out. It was awesome! Like you easily had 8ft of desk to yourself and a cabinet and lots of space to breathe.
- outworlder 4y ago
  > Open office workspaces are almost always crowded into a building that was made for cubicles or a warehouse or whatever. Yeah! See, at least with cubes you know exactly where your "space" ends. Not so with many open plan offices, they can always try to cram more.

ChuckNorris89 4y ago

Yeah, at the job I just left we had much less square meter space per employee in our open office than what egg laying chickens are required to have in Europe by law. We literally have it worse than farm animals in some offices.

ryandrake 4y ago

Sam Lowry's office at Information Retrieval[1] was supposed to depict a dystopianly-terrible office setup, but these day's I'd kill for a workspace like that. That's how bad offices are in 2023. 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mS5WLkb_Cxk https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mS5WLkb_Cxk