I’m curious if any company trying to get people back into the office has begun reverting it’s open floor plan to a more structured and divided one, allowing for more noise isolation and private work
Before the pandemic they were doing hotel seating and encouraging work from home and had reduced floor plans with smaller open seats that were not dedicated. They were internally discussing “BYOO,” or bring your own office and strangling corporate leased/owned space until it was only used for crucial in person meetings, interactions, and roles that had to be in the office for regulatory or practical purposes.
The pandemic forces that so suddenly that C suite folks freaked out and saw the way they came up ending. They saw an erosion of the culture and company they fostered and had a strong emotional response in the other direction.
During the pandemic no one accelerated real estate acquisition or reversed the BYOO squeeze policies. Now they are struggling seating people on the mandatory policies. Everything is the same - too few seats, hotel seating, smaller desk footprints, floor plans as open as the Montana sky. Morale is about zero. As compliance rates are around 30% at most large megacorps mandating in office N days a week management is increasingly becoming aggressive and oppressive. Attrition has been pretty low owing to the spring tech apocalypse, spurring increasing aggressiveness by management. But - hiring will pick up in 1Q2024 through 3Q24 as the mirage recession fails the materialize. Whether you believe in it or not funding is flowing for AI and that’ll further improve tech employment, especially as interest rates stabilize.
I was until recently a senior leader at one of the largest of the large megacorps with draconian RTOO policies. Myself I left a few weeks ago because they asked me to come in five days a week and joined a late stage startup being paid more, with more interesting work, and no mandatory in office.
If they value controlling my body over my contribution then they can have neither.
/s