4 ms·

The practical solution is to spend more money. That means high-wall cubicles (6'-8') or private offices. Those have been the known solutions for forty years.

• strangetimes 12y ago
  I think you're right in that there's no cheap, quick fix here. With tech companies so flush with cash/funding, can they really not afford to do something? I don't think cheapness can describe what's going on.
• AndrewKemendo 12y ago
  The practical solution is to spend more money. This is immensely frustrating because it is clear the OP doesn't have the money. So how do you do this if you don't have money for anything but Lucite tables and chairs?
  • imgabe 12y ago
    You don't. You set up your open plan office, and you take what employees are left over after the ones who are skilled enough to have their choice of working environment. This is still quite a lot of very skilled employees. Leverage them as best you can to make enough money to give them offices.
    • AndrewKemendo 12y ago
      Our solution is to keep everyone remote till we can build good spaces, however that is not possible for everyone. It seems ridiculous that people think there are only binary options here.
  • engendered 12y ago
    This is immensely frustrating because it is clear the OP doesn't have the money. Many organizations pay headhunters tens of thousands of dollars for a hire. Each person costs $100K+ (often significantly more) fully loaded. Yet somehow the price of some tall cube walls is the issue? It's flawed math, people scrimping on the environment and then maximizing head count, getting less out of the latter by cheaping on the former.
    • AndrewKemendo 12y ago
      This is hilarious because in other places you'll hear that salary is the most important thing and that as long as you're getting paid well then nothing else matters. Main takeaway: Find the best people who will work for the salary and environment you can offer.
  • a8da6b0c91d 12y ago
    I personally would be fine with an open office if it were truly quiet. A monastic level of sound courtesy. No talking in the main room. No phone ring tones. No desk phones or phone conversations. Put sound isolated phone booths somewhere for calls. If there are doors or elevators nearby make sure they don't bang or beep when used. I used to study in a big open, well lit room at the university library that was filled with people, but very quiet, and it was fine. You would have to establish a culture of seriously chewing out people for making noise. The problem is, introverts are not likely to do that. The only other factor is everybody has to have a proper wall to their back. Something in the mamillian brain freaks out when there are people moving about at your six.
    • engendered 12y ago
      I've encountered the "truly quiet" environment a few times, and really found that the worst of all: Every noise of the most meek activities, from the clicking of a mouse button to the quiet clearing of a throat, rings throughout the area. After you realize that, concerns that your own minor noises are irritating others puts you on edge, as you try to click the mouse button as softly as possible, ignore that tickle in your throat, etc. If there isn't good sound suppression, I've found the best alternative is sound camouflaging -- the HVAC fans always distributing noise, or even something as ridiculous as an area fountain. Something to make a base level of white, ignorable noise that stops you from focusing on the small noises.
      • strangetimes 12y ago
        I agree that absolute silence is a bit stifling. The spot I'm working in currently is very quiet and I actually prefer when the HVAC kicks on and covers up all the little sounds (mouse clicks, chairs creaking, etc.) with a base layer of white noise.
• rdtsc 12y ago
  And the corollary is probably that it was exactly because private offices and cubicle walls are expensive that somehow open office formats ends up being branded as a "cool" way to work. Kind of like small apartments when advertised for rent or sale are never "small" they are "cozy".
• tbrownaw 12y ago
  As much as I think I'd like my cubicle to be tall enough to have a standing-height monitor (so, ~6'), I also have heard it's important to have line-of-sight to something "far" as in 20 feet or more away, and suspect that too-tall walls would also make it too dark.
  • VLM 12y ago
    This is a very interesting comment. I won't work open office (have found a new job specifically to get out of that environment) and all the cube jobs I've had over the years have had very high ceilings. I wonder what it would be like to work in a 6ft cube with only 8 ft ceilings, perhaps in a very tall skyscraper. I have a window cube right now and can see the sky from my chair, pretty nice and that takes care of the 20 foot rule...