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Open plan worked for me when there was a very clear contract between every stakeholder. Firstly, everyone had free, good quality, sound blocking headphones. N

Open plan worked for me when there was a very clear contract between every stakeholder. Firstly, everyone had free, good quality, sound blocking headphones. Not just free as in standard equipment on your first day free. There were buckets of the things lying around and if you needed a new set you just grabbed some, no questions asked. VC funded opulence, yay! Secondly, there was an understanding amongst everyone on the shop floor that “headphones on” meant do not disturb, just as much as a closed office door. Violations were not tolerated but it was a social norm thing not an HR write up thing. Maybe people were getting the latter behind the scenes though? In return you end up with an office architecture that’s considerably easier to manage at the expense of turning the physical challenge of giving everyone an office into a — potentially intractable for some teams — people management challenge.

kstrauser 3y ago
A coworker repeatedly ignored a person’s headphones and would interrupt them anyway. One day I put a bright post-it note on my headphones: “Joe, don’t bother me”. I was in middle of flow, making some huge changes, when I noticed Joe standing next to me, laughing. “Hahaha, someone put a post-it note on your headphones!” I coulda killed him. “In startup land did CFO A stately office plan decree: Through EDM, the coders flow Unless they were disturbed by Joe Until we broke his knee.”
- dylan604 3y ago
  I printed out the infamous quote "Go away, or I will replace you with a small shell script." It was primarily meant for one specific employee known to have the gift of gab. Seeing how my job was to automate the most mundane/error prone tasks, it seemed to be pretty effective. I heard murmurings about how some thought it was rather rude, but I never had to speak to HR about it.
  - kridsdale1 3y ago
    Make them fear the dark wizard’s powers.
macNchz 3y ago
I’ve seen this work tolerably well in an open space that’s entirely engineers or similar roles, assuming there are enough conference rooms for people to peel off to for meetings and calls, and you can establish the culture of the main room having a library-esque hush. As soon as people start having multi party conversations in the main space because the conference rooms are booked 100% of the time, or people whose jobs involve talking all day are seated there, it’s game over. Noise cancelling headphones are no match for the 25th “Hey Bob, this is Jason at Intertrode, do you have 5 minutes?” of the day.
- Clubber 3y ago
  > “Hey Bob, this is Jason at Intertrode, do you have 5 minutes?” It's funny how Office Space is still relevant almost 25 years later.
  - kridsdale1 3y ago
    Mike Judge ended up with the same problem as South Park and The Onion. Silicon Valley ended before NFT, AI, and GameStop. All far more ludicrous than anything in fiction.
- kridsdale1 3y ago
  ACCOUNTS PAYABLE THIS IS WILHELMINA SPEAKING JUST A MOMENT
- erik_seaberg 3y ago
  Active noise cancellation is said to be improving, but it’s hard to go wrong with a big hunk of plastic if you can find a comfortable pair of closed-back circumaural phones. I’ve gone through about three pairs of HD 280. A former colleague would wear the same ear pro he uses at the gun range.
definitelyauser 3y ago
I've often run into the "just wear headphones" argument and never been a fan of it. Do you code with noise cancellation in a sort of sensory deprivation mode? Or do you listen to music? Listening to music while coding severely reduces my concentration, and I find it in no way to be a substitute for silence.
- dboreham 3y ago
  Contra-opinion: music significantly improves my concentration, but it has to be instrumental or classical otherwise brain gets distracted processing the lyrics.
  - kridsdale1 3y ago
    Your word-token-hardware is single-threaded.
  - eenokentee 3y ago
    [dead]
- gorgoiler 3y ago
  Yes I can imagine Wagner or Cardi B being counter productive here. Musical white noise — plaid noise? — works wonders though. As another commenter said: EDM has been a key factor in my productivity as a software engineer over the years.
- scaryclam 3y ago
  Me neither. If I'm concentrating I don't want to wear headphones all day. Even with my very comfortable ones, it's not that comfortable and as you say, it's not the same as silence, or just the quiet of a room without human noise. It's also the inverse problem as well though. Sometimes I want to listen to music, but I'm not doing anything that requires me to be unapproachable. Heck, sometimes I'm looking for a distraction, which is WHY I'm wearing the headphones, listening to something distracting! The idea that wearing headphones should mean "leave me alone" just doesn't work for me, and when I want to be left alone, wearing headphones doesn't mean I can concentrate
JohnFen 3y ago
I worked in an open office plan that did the headphones thing. I found that made it even more intolerable -- I can't stand being in a room with a bunch of people and being cut off from my senses. It makes me hyperaware, nervous, and even less able to work.

kstrauser 3y ago

A coworker repeatedly ignored a person’s headphones and would interrupt them anyway. One day I put a bright post-it note on my headphones: “Joe, don’t bother me”. I was in middle of flow, making some huge changes, when I noticed Joe standing next to me, laughing. “Hahaha, someone put a post-it note on your headphones!” I coulda killed him. “In startup land did CFO A stately office plan decree: Through EDM, the coders flow Unless they were disturbed by Joe Until we broke his knee.”

dylan604 3y ago
I printed out the infamous quote "Go away, or I will replace you with a small shell script." It was primarily meant for one specific employee known to have the gift of gab. Seeing how my job was to automate the most mundane/error prone tasks, it seemed to be pretty effective. I heard murmurings about how some thought it was rather rude, but I never had to speak to HR about it.
- kridsdale1 3y ago
  Make them fear the dark wizard’s powers.

macNchz 3y ago

I’ve seen this work tolerably well in an open space that’s entirely engineers or similar roles, assuming there are enough conference rooms for people to peel off to for meetings and calls, and you can establish the culture of the main room having a library-esque hush. As soon as people start having multi party conversations in the main space because the conference rooms are booked 100% of the time, or people whose jobs involve talking all day are seated there, it’s game over. Noise cancelling headphones are no match for the 25th “Hey Bob, this is Jason at Intertrode, do you have 5 minutes?” of the day.

Clubber 3y ago
> “Hey Bob, this is Jason at Intertrode, do you have 5 minutes?” It's funny how Office Space is still relevant almost 25 years later.
- kridsdale1 3y ago
  Mike Judge ended up with the same problem as South Park and The Onion. Silicon Valley ended before NFT, AI, and GameStop. All far more ludicrous than anything in fiction.
kridsdale1 3y ago
ACCOUNTS PAYABLE THIS IS WILHELMINA SPEAKING JUST A MOMENT
erik_seaberg 3y ago
Active noise cancellation is said to be improving, but it’s hard to go wrong with a big hunk of plastic if you can find a comfortable pair of closed-back circumaural phones. I’ve gone through about three pairs of HD 280. A former colleague would wear the same ear pro he uses at the gun range.

definitelyauser 3y ago

I've often run into the "just wear headphones" argument and never been a fan of it. Do you code with noise cancellation in a sort of sensory deprivation mode? Or do you listen to music? Listening to music while coding severely reduces my concentration, and I find it in no way to be a substitute for silence.

dboreham 3y ago
Contra-opinion: music significantly improves my concentration, but it has to be instrumental or classical otherwise brain gets distracted processing the lyrics.
- kridsdale1 3y ago
  Your word-token-hardware is single-threaded.
- eenokentee 3y ago
  [dead]
gorgoiler 3y ago
Yes I can imagine Wagner or Cardi B being counter productive here. Musical white noise — plaid noise? — works wonders though. As another commenter said: EDM has been a key factor in my productivity as a software engineer over the years.
scaryclam 3y ago
Me neither. If I'm concentrating I don't want to wear headphones all day. Even with my very comfortable ones, it's not that comfortable and as you say, it's not the same as silence, or just the quiet of a room without human noise. It's also the inverse problem as well though. Sometimes I want to listen to music, but I'm not doing anything that requires me to be unapproachable. Heck, sometimes I'm looking for a distraction, which is WHY I'm wearing the headphones, listening to something distracting! The idea that wearing headphones should mean "leave me alone" just doesn't work for me, and when I want to be left alone, wearing headphones doesn't mean I can concentrate

JohnFen 3y ago

I worked in an open office plan that did the headphones thing. I found that made it even more intolerable -- I can't stand being in a room with a bunch of people and being cut off from my senses. It makes me hyperaware, nervous, and even less able to work.