When interviewing, I will absolutely rule a company out if the office space isn't appropriate. I like open offices, but I need my own desk, and my back to a wall. Any companies with bullpen-style shared long tables is immediately out.
This is huge, I HATE having my back to a opening and one that people are constantly walking by. No I'm not redditing/screwing around at work but I think I deserve some level of privacy. Closing/hiding banking tabs, insurance statements, pay stubs, etc is really taxing and it means that I normally have to switch off my music before doing any of these tasks so that I can hear people approaching and then I forget to turn my music back on and get distracted by conversations/people around me resulting in less work getting done until I can get back in the "zone". I'm also extremely jumpy and strongly dislike being snuck up on (even when it wasn't that person's intention) which is why I want my back to a wall. It definitely drives up my stress levels to be so "exposed".
PS: For those of you thinking this helps cut down on goofing off and/or If you need to see my screen to know I'm working then just fire me, I can't/won't work under such conditions.
Note: While I'm not a huge fan of cubicles I don't have a huge issue with them, just how ours are laid out (Large cube with a desk in each corner facing the wall). I can see some advantages but IMHO the privacy issue trumps them all.
Again, I want to thank you for your suggestion but I just don't think it will work for me.
Furthermore I use my personal computer as my work computer so there are apps/notifications that are not of a work-nature and are not for my coworkers eyes. Also I don't know if you have company chat or use some chat program at work but I'm guessing you would not like all of your chat's to be public or even just public with your co-workers. What I'm trying to say is I get where you are coming from but I don't think you are considering all the things you might do on your computer that you might not want to hide but at the same time you don't want to advertise.
More and more what happens on my screen is an extension of my brain and so you could say watching me use my computer is watching me think (from the searches I do, the docs I look up, etc). No one would consider giving a running monologue of their thoughts throughout the day but watching my screen get's pretty close to that, for me at least.... I may be an edge case but I think that I deserve some level of privacy. If you want to know what I'm doing ask the PM (or look on my whiteboard) or look at my commits or just ask me, you don't need to watch over my shoulder to know what I'm up to.
Not for the US so could you give me some examples?
Some people have said it may be due to reports that run at night and can't have new data coming in while they run or something similar but I don't buy it. If that's the case then just modify your query such that the data it gets has a "WHERE submitted_date <= <EOD DateTime>".
This is almost always because there is some ambiguously worded regulatory or statutory requirement that says that department or entity has to provide live personal support, and rather than pay the increased staff they just take the site down.
Anyway, I was the butt of a lot of jokes when I'd close out of a full screen app and one of them would walk by and see it. It's a bit dehumanizing to have the two most important people in the company make fun of you at the lunch table every day. "Hey Morgan, which cartoons are you watching now?" "My 5 year old can recommend some for you" and so on. Yeah, I was a college kid and all my peers were into anime too, but it stings when your bosses make fun of you every day. If we had had a more sensible cubicle layout with our screens facing away from the entrance, it would have been a less stressful job.
Or if you had bosses with a modicum of respect for their employees, independent of cubicle arrangement.
Needless to say, I quit working there once I was out of school, and went back to government work.
I'm curious why you want your back to the wall. All the people I know that do this are chronic goof offs. They always scramble to cover whatever they're looking at when I come in to talk with them.
I am genuinely curious and not trolling you.
EDIT: downvotes? Really? This is a very legit question and is producing legit conversation.
When you're not doing work, it makes goofing off on the Internet less of a mental relief, and things are overall more stressful.
It's a primal fear kind of thing, and doesn't have to be rational.
"Typed while goofing off in my cubicle".
Interesting. I'm exactly the opposite. When I see people walking in front of me it's a total distraction. It makes it almost impossible to concentrate.
I personally want everyone behind me to be known, with entries where strangers can come from somewhere in my direct or peripheral vision range. Or a loud enough door that I can hear someone opening it.
Yes, this sort of setup is perfect for those that want to goof off. However, that should be easily reflected in productivity reports through a work tracking system such as Pivotal or Jira. If the employee is doing all their assigned tasks within the expected allotted time then all should be fine.
Yep, grade school is exactly where I developed a lot of this, plus having a born malicious 6 years younger brother. But I can slot people into "safe" categories and then not worry about them (see my other comments in this subthread).
As for "come up behind me to stare", you just have to get in the mindset that they'll be awed by the skills you're displaying ^_^.
In college I would always prefer sit in the very back of the lecture hall, back to the wall, even though I knew that real go-getters were supposed to sit in the front. I get really startled if people walk up behind me and try to get my attention, especially if they touch me, my clothing, or my chair. I don't like to be in a space where I can't see who is coming in and out of it, for my own safety as well as to minimize jump-scares. If people coming up behind you while you're all vulnerable and absorbed in thought is something that bothers you, having to work in a space where this is a constant possibility is annoying in the same way that working around high-pitched mechanical background noises or rapidly flickering lights is annoying. It's constant low-level apprehension and stress.
When you introduce screens into the equation, as in open office, there's a new annoyance which I guess you might call "violation of intellectual personal space". Have you ever gotten really annoyed that someone was reading your book over your shoulder? Or felt antsy when someone grabbed your laptop to do an internet search? Or had a coworker glance over at your screen when you were deep in thought and say "Hey, what's that?" Computers, books, and notes can feel like extensions one's mind and it's annoying when anybody can come peruse what we're thinking. My monitor is my mind-workspace. I'm happy to have visitors, but not at any old time they feel like strolling through the door!
I'm not saying that YOU think this, but your comment brought it to mind: Some people think that by making it so that anyone can see your screen, you're less likely to goof off. (With the logical follow-up: Anyone who wants their back to the wall at work just wants to goof off.) Neither is true, in my anecdotal experience. People in open offices will still goof off, they'll just be more sneaky about it. (Or, there will be a complete breakdown in focus and professionalism, and everyone will goof off in a completely brazen manner.)
This! I am extremely jumpy and I hate being snuck up when I'm deep in thought/in the zone which I am as often as possible. If I notice you approaching me you can probably assume I am between tasks or took a break because when I am programming I have my music turned up and I can't hear people walking up and even my peripheral vision is limited in these situations. I can't tell you how many times someone has walked up next to me and I haven't noticed except for when I turn my head to see my laptop screen (where I keep all my chats) and catch them in the corner of my eye and almost fall out of my chair.
I try to not let this affect my level of focus because I really do think that's more important than a few scares a day but if I had my back to a wall then I wouldn't have to worry about it at all.
> almost fall out of my chair
> a few scares a day
Preach, my easily startled brother, preach. But yet your co-workers don't catch on that you jump-scare so easily?
We should make little signs or banners for people's desks. "Deeply Absorbed Programmer: Do Not Sneak Up On." Issue little handbooks on how to safely interrupt a programmer, as we do currently with sleepwalkers.
If I have to interrupt someone in an open-plan office and can't just message them to get their attention (seriously, what's wrong with just messaging people for non-urgent issues?), I am careful to approach them from the front or peripherally-viewable side and try visual cues first (hand-waving, etc.). I would NEVER use a physical alert method (touching them, knocking on their desk, dropping papers in on their keyboard, etc.). This is one of my several guarantees to the nation.
They do and they ask me "How can I come over without startling you" to which I reply "Message me on chat that you are coming over or get me a desk where I have my back to a wall".
I really dislike when someone walks over and stands behind me waiting for a good break point. While they may have good intentions I don't like being observed without my knowledge and it's probably just going to freak me out more when I "feel" your presence and turn around.
I find it hard to really concentrate on something with random people walking around or hanging out behind me. It has nothing to do with them looking at my screen even - just knowing someone is standing around behind me can be a little unnerving. I'd much prefer having them in front of me than behind me.
It almost feels like a primal survival instinct. When you're concentrating on work you're more vulnerable because you're less aware of your surroundings. It's not like I'm really expecting to be attacked from behind or anything but something deep in my brain is sending up an alarm.
"Goof offs" sounds like something a McDonalds manager has to micromanage for amongst his summer hire of local teenagers. I didn't spend four years getting a BSCS, studying compiler internals, graph theory, finite state automata, 1st, 2nd and 3rd normal forms, the fetch/execute cycle etc., plus all my subsequent study, so that my manager can monitor me at any moment to see if I'm "goofing off".
Your comment is exactly the reason why I need a desk with my back to the wall. If I walk in on an interview and see I would not have that, I have a suspicion that managers are people with your mentality.
I don't want to work at a company with potential goof offs coding elementary PHP and people who police them to make sure they're spending every second pounding out code. I want to do professional work and have the autonomy to do so.
I know I am not going to be eaten while working in an office building, but that does not stop my brain from sending a surge of adrenaline into my bloodstream when somebody unexpectedly appears behind me. Those adrenaline surges are not conducive to concentration or productivity..
2. I'm not willing to be scrutinized by others for exactly how I spend my time. Or how I appear to be spending my time. Goofing off, at least I'm only distracting myself, instead of wandering around distracting others. "Following orders" leads to intellectual heat-death. In the software profession this kills earning power.
3. Many people fail to realize that whatever minor thing they are currently locked on to psychologically is totally inconsequential. I can't have them hovering over me and yammering about it and trying to get me to click/type/open/smell whichever program/website/document/foodstuff has gotten them whipped up in a frenzy. People aren't conscious of boundaries when they're excited and this needs to be defended against physically with doors, desks, and body position.
4. Maybe it helps individual productivity to the detriment of group productivity. When I get a big raise based on group productivity, I'll start to care about it.