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Comment by tombert | Hacker News Reader

I really wish this open office trend would just die already. I like all my coworkers just fine, but the combination of conference calls and casual conversation (don't even get me started on how bad it gets during the World Cup) and people constantly coming and going from the office ends up being really distracting.

What I find more frustrating is all of the open-office apologists, that claim that they work better in an open space. Statistically, this seems unlikely, but even if that's true, a vast majority of people work measurably worse with this kind of setup [1].

This isn't everyone, but what's worse is that there isn't actually any kind of cafeteria/sitting-area to eat at my company, and living in NYC, going out to eat every day gets kind of pricey, forcing me to eat at my desk.

I've been debating asking if I can work remote for three days a week.

[1] http://www.theguardian.com/money/work-blog/2014/sep/29/open-...

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Open offices photograph better, have been on the right side of the modern&cool™ narrative, are more flexible to rearrange, a bit cheaper to rent and maintain and there's always a sense of busyness going on.

It's very easy for managers to keep track of their herd, see which face they don't like and flex to the colleague/competition using the always important "how many workers I have under my wing/foot" metric.

I think the only downside of open offices is that productivity takes a significant hit and makes worker health and morale a nightmare. But other than that they are fine.

Open office plans are wonderful for the micromanager. Everyone's screen is for all to see - and the moment someone happens not to be looking at an IDE, it's an opportunity to ding someone on their performance review.

While I personally am hyper-focused at work (perhaps too much to the point of tunnel vision), I know peers who have received negative comments despite delivering stellar work - all because they look at HN or doing online shopping from time to time.

That’s my nightmare. I spent a long time in a shop like that. Never again. Working from home is amazing.

I'm blessed with a temperamental car that forces me to work from home occasionally... Despite 3 cats begging for attention, I get more done before lunchtime than in a usual work week in open/cubicle office.

Yes I like my coworkers, that's why I ask them to join me for lunch. When I work I need silence, which is a precious commodity in an open plan.

People can even feel different from you. The shock! Personally, I really don't care about open office. I get my stuff done one way or another. However, working remotely is definitely my preferred option, mostly because I don't feel any need to be in the office and I am just more comfortable at home.

What I never even want to imagine is having to go work in a office where then I have to feel lonely. That's the worst of both worlds.

I never said people can't feel different than me. I said that it seems unlikely that they're actually more productive in an open office, and that even if they specifically are one of the rare few that actually do work better, a vast majority of people don't.

This is empirical, not just a difference of opinion.

> People can even feel different from you. The shock!

That is exactly what I told my boss when they introduced our new open office and they said "works fine for me".

It goes both ways.

I have the impression that people who are not afraid of open offices did not work in an office that was particularly bad. When the manager joins in the constant chatter, talking all the time about video games or sports, it's very difficult to do get work done. You have no one to turn to because the management is in on it.

I worked in open offices that didn't bother me. Generally large companies with more than 60 employees. The noise becomes an indistinguishable background sound and long conversations are almost non-existent.

It's the smaller ones that annoy me. Those with 10 to 15 people. Conversations are easy to hear and understand, so your brain picks up on them. Since it's small, it turns into a bunch of little friend groups who have constant conversations.

...

Describing it just now, I notice that I am describing a high school class versus a university class. That's exactly how they feel. It only takes one or two disruptive agents to ruin everything.

Yes, I worked in a small office 2 weeks ago, and every conversation made it into my ears. Now I'm in an open office with 60+ people and it's like sitting in a fast food restaurant, noisy chatter that I can tune out. If there's some conversation particularly loud/annoying I just put on my headphones. It's not that bad, but I have the ability to tune it out, and I feel other types of people can't do that.

I’m glad for you. You can tune it out. Some of us can’t tune it out, no matter what.

Well, not until we either put on our maximum NR headphones and play our music at hearing-destroying levels. Maybe by the time we are completely and totally deaf, we will be able to tune it out.

Do they work better, or do they just feel better about it? I mean I can imagine that there's a segment of people who feel that time spent on discussing things can also be productive. And to a point / in certain situations that makes sense - why waste eight hours writing code when you could also talk for five minutes and do half of it?

But I get it, I too tend to measure my productivity and whether I've had a good day by the amount of code or functionality I added, not so much the softer skills.

I will admit that there is the occasional benefit of the "off the cuff" conversation that you overhear which allows you to add or receive input that you wouldn't have otherwise before, but I think that the amount of times that this is actually useful is a lot less than reported.

I also think that those benefits get quickly offset the second that I get a cold that I wouldn't have otherwise, or get pulled away from something for a triviality.

I'm one of those people. I've done two jobs where I wasn't in an open office, one was a cubicle, one was a private office. Both times I felt very lonely and disconnected, and my motivation suffered greatly.

If I needed maximize output for a single day then I'd probably choose a private office, but over a long period of time it definitely hurts me. So the answer to "do I work better or just feel better about it" is: both.

That said, I feel I'm on the extreme end here as I would also cite loneliness and isolation as the single biggest drawback of being an engineer. I think many engineers would list the ability to work alone on your own stuff as a plus.

As you can see in this thread, most people who say they like open offices are not aware of the "team room" alternative that is shown to be highly productive, and/or they like open offices because they spend their time "hanging out" at the office and don't need to concentrate.

Who cares whether the employees get more done? Two questions matter.

Are employees less depressed? (-->prevents PR issues)

Does the company get more done in the long term? (<--maximized retention)

This is a shit job and being close to other humans makes it easier to cope.

I can't speak for anyone else, but if I don't accomplish anything of substance at the end of the day, and this trend keeps on for multiple days in a row, I start getting really depressed.

I'm not saying that it's 100% open-office's fault if I don't accomplish much, but I do think it can be a strong contributing factor.

Same here. I get my happy vibes at work when I make a thing.

> I do think it can be a strong contributing factor.

Even if it's a small factor, an open office doesn't actually help with collaboration, so it's all downside and no upside.

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