
Ask HN: Which companies give programmers offices? - jjazwiecki
Often when I suggest to non-programmers that programmers should get their own offices, I&#x27;m met with incredulity: &quot;Where do <i>any</i> programmers get their own offices???&quot; Microsoft and Fog Creek come to mind, but where else?
======
msluyter
On the general question of open vs. private offices, my views have tempered
over time. The first time I worked in an open office, I hated it. But I've
come to realize that a lot depends on the layout of the office and that there
are better and worse ways to configure one.

The first case -- the one I hated -- had a) long rows of desks, b) bright
overhead fluorescent lights, c) a lot of noise due to being in a large room
with sales/marketing, d) a lot of visual distractions due to people walking up
& down the aisles, and e) few available areas to go to collaborate away from
your desks.

Now, I'm also in an open office, but I find it quite livable, because: a) my
desk faces the wall, for fewer visual distractions, b) the room is comfortably
lit (ie, not too bright)[1], c) it's a smaller room with only engineering and
is generally quieter[2], d) there are enough areas to go if you need to
collaborate.

All this is to say that, while the evidence is that open offices generally
suck, there's probably a number of ways to ameliorate their problems to some
degree without having to resort to private offices. I don't think I'd prefer
an office to my current setup, actually.

[1] I think this element is underrated. In fact, I'd be curious to know if
there's a verifiable correlation between brightness levels and how loud people
tend to talk. There's something about a dim room that seems to induce people
to lower their voices.

[2] Small, but not too small. There's a sort of sweet spot. I was once in a
room with 3 other people and it was maddening because it was generally quiet
but every little noise -- coughing, swallowing, etc... -- was seemingly
amplified by the overall quietness to became hugely annoying. (An inverse
concept explains why I can work quite well in a coffee shop despite the
background din.)

~~~
mindcrime
_a) my desk faces the wall, for fewer visual distractions_

I'm sitting here feeling stunned that anybody could ever _want_ their desk
facing a wall, as the implication (in terms of any "open plan" environment) is
that their back is facing, well, nothing. IOW, somebody can walk up behind you
unnoticed. Me personally, I _hate_ that with a passion. I'd pay money to have
my desk facing out with my back to the wall, just so nobody can walk up behind
me.

~~~
always_good
I feel anxious when anyone can see my screen. I should be able to visit HN
without feeling guilty as long as I'm getting my work done, but when I'm
facing a wall, it's almost paralyzing.

------
jonhmchan
Stack Overflow does. I'm an engineer there and we still think providing
private offices to our engineering team is important for their productivity.
This includes engineers, SREs, designers, data scientists, PMs, and others.

However, most of our engineering team is remote and if they're not in one of
our locations, we give them pretty much what they'd like to build their own
home office or go to a coworking space.

For me, I'm actually nomadic, so I tend to work from wherever I'm staying or
end up in cafes a lot of time. I still get the support I need if my work
"station" isn't optimal.

TL;DR Stack Overflow provides private offices, but is really flexible,
especially given its remote policy.

~~~
nfriedly
I'm still occasionally sad that I bombed an interview at SO a while back. I
had prepped for more of a front-end/full stack JS role, and got asked a series
of low-level data structure questions. I thought I did alright given the
circumstances (I did work out the correct answer to each one), but the
interviewer wasn't impressed.

I asked for a do-over and they said no. Oh well...

~~~
Jach
Typically companies will let you 'do-over'/re-apply in 6-12 months, so there's
still hope!

~~~
nfriedly
Haha, yea, but I ended up at IBM Watson, which has been a pretty good gig so
far. (It was a little better before they flip-flopped on remote, but that
hasn't affected me as much as I thought it would.)

------
kuharich
Old Microsoft: it was a BillG ethic: anyone touching software got an office:
software design engineers, PM's, QA, even admins ... it allowed one to be
quiet and focus. And signaled to co-workers - do not disturb ...

~~~
Chris911
Most new buildings at Microsoft now have open office plans.

~~~
qq66
This is mostly due to employee demand (although some employees are very angry
about it).

~~~
existencebox
Microsoftie here. I haven't seen any indication for it to be due to employee
demand. The vast majority of engineers on my team, and my last N teams, have
agreed it was top down from leadership; and even those that preferred open
offices agreed that cost cutting and space utilization are likely driving
factors.

To contribute to the broader discussion; SOME teams here still have offices,
but it's a dying breed. I consider myself very lucky that I found one that
did, and it was certainly a factor in my choice.

~~~
orange_bear
Former Apple employee here. That sounds exactly like what I witnessed. The new
Apple HQ is very much open office and the design was definitely top-down from
execs - I just know that I had no input at all even though it was my
workplace. Always got my best work done at home.

~~~
crispytx
If companies can't afford to give programmers their own offices, then they
should just let them work remotely from their own private offices in their
homes.

------
nfriedly
I have a small private office that I just lease myself. I bicycle in every day
and work "remote" for IBM. It's fantastic.

If I want some noise, I'll work from home (I have a 3-year old.)

The down side is that IBM's management has recently done a 180 on remote
working and is now "strongly encouraging" me to move to one of their offices
and work in a cubicle.

I'm pretty sure they won't actually fire me for not moving, but any promotion
is probably going to be harder to come by until things (hopefully) swing back
in the other direction.

Or I'll just retire. The benefit of living in Ohio is that I can save like 40%
of my salary and still live comfortably. (And lease an office for $225/month!)

~~~
united893
> Remote, IBM

Did this not affect your role: [http://www.nbcnews.com/business/business-
news/ibm-tells-its-...](http://www.nbcnews.com/business/business-news/ibm-
tells-its-remote-employees-get-back-office-n763441)

~~~
nfriedly
Yea, before that, everything was roses. After that, I was initially told that
I would be fired if I didn't move on site (I was given a few location
choices).

I said "no", got a new job lined up, and then about 4 months later, they
decided not to fire me (they apparently did let go of some people, I was an
exception).

I don't recall the exact phrasing, but it was at least hinted that I shouldn't
expect a promotion. I never received any of it in writing, it was all phone
calls from the start.

I did get a 5% raise a few months later, though.

~~~
Sohcahtoa82
That's gotta be quite the complement to your value to the company. Not only
did they not let you go, but you still got a decent raise later. Even if they
hinted that you won't be eligible for promotions (I imagine that decision
comes from someone higher than the person allowing you to continue working
from home), I'd still be feeling good about myself if I were in your shoes.

~~~
nfriedly
Yea, I'm really pretty thankful; I think my teammates and manager really went
to bat for me when the whole thing came down. Without their help, IBM almost
certainly would have let me go.

It didn't work out so well for a colleague of mine who was on the design team.
Despite several other teams within IBM trying to hire him, the company stayed
the course and let him go. I don't know the full details, but I do know that
he's a world-class web/mobile engineer and we're definitely worse off for
loosing him. He's in Pittsburgh, if anyone is looking for someone there (or
remote):
[https://www.linkedin.com/in/joshuabsmith/](https://www.linkedin.com/in/joshuabsmith/)

~~~
taheca
I just reached out to him. Thank you so much for letting us know about their
short sighted decision.

------
qnk
Stack Overflow has blogged about their private offices for developers many
times before. This is a post from 2015, I'm not sure if that's still the case:
[https://stackoverflow.blog/2015/01/16/why-we-still-
believe-i...](https://stackoverflow.blog/2015/01/16/why-we-still-believe-in-
private-offices/)

~~~
52-6F-62
Colour me green with envy. I'm working in one of those fabled "cubical farms"
mentioned in the post.

Half of the company has gone full open office, and the laggers (who didn't get
redone before the last CEO suddenly quit) seem to not be changing. I could
wander elsewhere in the building to work once in a while, but eventually
people would start questioning where I am.. and I'd be missing out on my
single monitor and ergonomic seating. I work for a modern company with 30 year
outdated office structure... At least its feeling that way today. Yep, right
there -- there's the envy!

~~~
taternuts
A lot of people would be jealous of your cubicle setup, including me. If your
company decides to update their '30 year outdated office structure', you'd
most likely be stripped of your cubicle and have no real private space. I'd
venture a guess that you'd curse yourself for taking your precious cube for
granted.

~~~
52-6F-62
You've got a point, I do like having a little personal space to drop my
things, but I'm actually not sure what I'd like better. I'm not much of a
nester. Yet an office... especially like the ones at SO would be pretty sweet.

This is the fist time I've worked in a cubicle. I rarely see sunlight,
although I recently was moved about 5 feet closer to a window (with walls
still in the way). I used to either work outside (in other occupations), or at
varying locales. It's new to me to be tied to one place, bathing in
fluorescent lighting.

Recently the company took offices away from people and moved them into
cubicles, including management. The open office spaces have more private
sections to tuck into for the day, they're just bookable.

------
module0000
My programming career involved an office at every position (Blue Cross Blue
Shield, Cisco, HP, XTime, VMWare, and a handful of private equity groups). As
I was transitioning into another field, the "open office" craze was taking
over. I could be wrong, but I have a strong feeling I would not have enjoyed
it. Nothing like being an hour into analyzing a core dump to be jerked back to
reality by someone interrupting you!

~~~
Cthulhu_
An hour focused on one thing? Lucky you!

------
pixelmonkey
My team at Parse.ly is fully remote/distributed -- and one of the motivating
reasons I formed the team that way was to reproduce the feel of Fog Creek's
"bionic office", but in each engineer's home office space.

I discussed this a little in my "Notes on Distributed Teams" presentation
here:

[http://pixelmonkey.org/pub/distributed-teams/notes/#open-
pla...](http://pixelmonkey.org/pub/distributed-teams/notes/#open-plan-vs-open-
source)

Here's how my personal home office looks:

[https://flic.kr/p/v1NZ73](https://flic.kr/p/v1NZ73)

(Shameless plug, here are the positions we're hiring for, if you're
interested!
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14902227](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14902227))

~~~
taheca
Just out of curiosity, why do you have two webcams?

~~~
pixelmonkey
Oh, simple explanation -- I have two computers. I have an always-on Mac Mini
these days, and then a docking station for a Lenovo X1C. One webcam on each.
(Since we have a remote team, I sometimes sit in on meetings [listening only]
while doing work on my laptop, and for convenience and to save CPU, I do it
from a second machine.)

------
LVB
At Garmin in Salem, OR, they have four-person quads. These are enclosed spaces
with an additional central table, storage, ceiling and door. Though not my own
office, I liked it. Quiet, everyone had a corner with ample space, and a nice
group dynamic formed. Devs would move occasionally and you'd get to know other
people pretty well.

------
jaegerpicker
That's why programmers should work remotely. It's the best thing I've ever
done for my career. Moved back from Management to IC because it was remote and
it's been amazing.

~~~
mooreds
Remote work is great for so many reasons. Off the top of my head:

For the company:

    
    
       * less office space expense
       * bigger talent pool
       * low cost benefit
       * increased documentation
       * encourages the trend towards outcome based management (as opposed to butts in seats)
    

For the programmer:

    
    
       * more control over their work environment
       * more control over their time
       * no "commuting" subsidy for their employers
       * arbitrage payscales and standard of living
       * working vacations become possible
    

There are some downsides in terms of increased coordination costs and I have
some friends that will never get to work remote because of security concerns,
but for most developers this trend is fantastic.

~~~
hackermailman
One of the downsides is managers think we don't do anything all day as they
can't stand over us monitoring for efficiency, so insist we are available at a
whim on Slack, which makes Slack the new open office where you have to stop
reasoning about what you're building and answer somebody's meme post on Slack
or a manager's musings that would've been an email in the past you could reply
to later. To me this is just as great as disturbance as the door opening to
the foozball and video game room with a crowd of people yelling.

~~~
greymeister
When management don't understand how to gauge productivity they resort to this
"ass-in-seat" metric. It's the circumstance I've dealt with in most of my
software positions and also the source of most friction to WFH or remote
employees.

------
sizzzzlerz
My 600-person company, a wholly-owned part of a much, much larger national
multi-billion dollar company has single or double private offices, with doors,
for the entire staff, new hires, IT, admin, everyone, at our headquarters in
SV as well as our smaller, satellite offices. AFAIK, there is no plan to
change this. If, however, our current lease isn't renewed and the company
moves, all bets are off. I've heard rumors that our parent company isn't happy
with the "wasted" space. We'll see.

~~~
bdavisx
You might want to "name and not-shame" them, some people want to know because
they want to work for companies like this.

------
pyrox420
AccuLynx - we aren't even in a tech hotbed. Just little ol' Beloit, WI. We got
to build a brand new office building with offices for all devs. Great place to
work, awesome perks. We saw a marked throughput improvement after moving to
the new office.

~~~
prdonahue
> we aren't even in a tech hotbed

That's precisely why you have offices. Real estate is extremely cheap there
compared to tech centers such as SF/ Bay Area.

------
mpa000
I manage developers for the publishing arm of a professional association.
While I did not have an office when I started as a dev here over a decade ago,
all of our developers now have their own offices while we two managers share
one. Priorities.

Immediately prior to this, as a junior member of a non-IT/IS-department rapid
development group for a utility company, I was relegated to whatever cubicle
they could find to stuff me in, usually on the periphery of the call center
area. This is also where they'd stick the COBOL guys they'd had to hire back
as consultants, along with others who didn't fit into any of the (many) union
contract workflows.

(I was a listed as a line-item in the same cost code group as a rented
photocopier or scanner, meaning that for most of my tenure there I had ZERO
contact with anyone from HR. It was glorious.)

------
batbomb
Most people programming in National Labs get offices, though you might need to
share with one person. If you are in the bay area, think about SLAC or LBNL.

~~~
cweagans
Depends on where in SLAC you're working. If you're in the IT building, you'll
frequently need to share a larger room with 3-5 other people.

------
gwbas1c
Honestly, I'm less concerned about an "office." A cube with high walls is more
similar to an "office" than an open layout where everyone shares a table.

What's more important is company culture. Does your company expect you to
accept interruptions at any time for any reason, no matter how trivial? Is
your manager willing to run interference when suddenly every new employee in
every department shows up expecting that you'll handhold them?

You can have an office with a bad company culture; you'll find that your
office door is always full of lurkers, or you'll find that you can't walk
between your office and the bathroom without getting mobbed with "urgent"
requests that need your attention immediately.

What's more important is to ensure that management avoids distractions, that
newcomers in other departments are trained, and that processes are established
and followed when needed. Handholding should not be required from any
engineers; instead mentoring and process refinement goes a lot further than a
door that you can close.

------
jedwardhawkins
Micro Focus in Provo, UT provides offices. The last company I worked for was a
mature startup with an open floor plan. Most of the noise complaints were
mitigated by noise cancelling headphones which were purchased for each
engineer.

~~~
mindcrime
In my experience, noise cancelling headphones don't really solve any problems.
They do nothing for "visual noise" and even for audio, the noise cancelling
mode just feels artificial (which it is). I find that, for myself, I rarely
want "no noise", I just want the quiet rush of the AC vents, maybe the pitter-
patter of footfalls in the distance, etc. But no loud noises / talking / music
/ etc. in the immediate area.

------
baccredited
I've had multiple federal government programming jobs with offices. I consider
it a requirement at this point.

------
s1gs3gv
I think choice is important. Some people prefer one, some the other. The best
working environment I've experienced in my life as a software developer was at
Bell Labs in the 80s, where small private offices was the norm.

On the other hand, its good to have open working areas available when they are
appropriate. In Bell Labs, we'd often congregate near the railings overlooking
the Holmdel atrium while our build finished or downstairs in the large open
seating areas.

~~~
MrBuddyCasino
This. Just let people choose for themselves. We have a regular open office
room, a special "quiet zone" open office room, and several smaller rooms to
retreat to if you want even more privacy.

There are people in all three areas, usually the same ones. There is no one
size that fits all. Just let people choose.

------
DarkContinent
Epic in Madison, WI, gives all employees their own offices. (I can't find a
source but I've been on a tour.)

~~~
tuna-piano
The (only?) female-founded, tech unicorn you've never heard of. For some
reason, Epic, and it's enormous success, doesn't get much coverage.

~~~
azdle
Not sure more coverage would be good for them. I graduated from the U of MN so
I was well aware of them, they were always recruiting. They had a reputation
for only hiring fresh grads, enticed by 'perks', and then working them as hard
as possible until they quit. They probably see it as in their best interest to
not be talked about too much.

------
caboteria
The last place I worked where I got a private office (and probably the last
place I ever will) was the MITRE Corporation in Bedford, MA, a federally-
funded R&D corporation. Level AC-5 and above got solo offices, AC-4's had to
share.

------
rbanffy
Two places that allow you (actually they prefer) to work remotely are Avaaz
(avaaz.org) and Canonical. Both may share the cost of a rented office. I can't
speak highly enough of either - awesome teams, awesome missions.

------
luu
Microsoft is switching from offices to open office plans. Buildings with
offices are slowly being remodeled to open plan.

My first team started off two-to-an-office (unless you had something like 5 or
6 years of seniority, in which case you'd get your own office), but they moved
to open offices when their building got remodeled.

~~~
dannysu
I'm hearing that things are moving in that direction as well. Were there
reasons provided or were you asked for your preference at all?

~~~
crunchyplastic
I was invited to an employee feedback session at Microsoft. We were asked to
discuss teamwork and collaboration and float any ideas we had for changes that
could be made to improve them. There were plenty of ideas, none of them
involved open offices. Strangely, the consultants running the session used
"different workspaces" as an example several times. After it showed up on the
slides for the fourth time, I brought up the rumours about moving to open
offices and said I thought it would harm productivity and wouldn't have a
noticable effect on collaboration. Private offices with whiteboards and enough
space for 3-4 people to stand and talk are fantastic for collaboration as-is.
Several other attendees voiced their agreement. I don't recall anyone
advocating for open offices. When the session ended I suggested to the senior
Microsoft representative there that a survey be conducted to gauge engineer's
preferences on work spaces. He said those decisions weren't in his hands
(almost certainly true). I never did get such a survey.

The open offices that I did see at Microsoft were actually pretty nice - they
were discrete spaces with room for ~25 desks and 2-3 meeting rooms attached.
Certainly better than the spaces I've seen at startups, but still not close to
individual offices in terms of pleasantness.

As for a reason, I suspect it's the same reason they unified dev and test into
a single discipline. "Because that's what Facebook does."

------
borplk
Do pretty much all programmers in Microsoft get their own office?

Is it as simple as that or there's more to it?

~~~
latencyloser
Definitely depends on the group, but I think mostly just whatever building you
happen to be in. The building I'm in is newly remodeled. Meaning entirely
open-office.

In my opinion, my building/group/whatever does it wrong by jamming so many
bodies in the same room together. There's 26 desks here in a room that looks
as though it could comfortable fit about half that many. I've since adopted
big sound-proof headphones and a wall of monitors that eliminate most
distractions. But the biggest annoyance to me is that there's constantly a
line for the bathrooms. Too many people for what the building was originally
designed for, I think. Assuming we better limited the room capacity, I could
likely tolerate this just fine.

~~~
colanderman
> Too many people for what the building was originally designed for

OSHA regulates the ratio of employees to toilets ("water closets"). Check this
table [1] and file an OSHA complaint [2] if the requirement isn't met.

[1]
[https://www.osha.gov/pls/oshaweb/owadisp.show_document?p_tab...](https://www.osha.gov/pls/oshaweb/owadisp.show_document?p_table=STANDARDS&p_id=9790#1910.141%28c%29%281%29%28i%29)

[2]
[https://www.osha.gov/pls/osha7/eComplaintForm.html](https://www.osha.gov/pls/osha7/eComplaintForm.html)

~~~
hinkley
I assume those numbers are per employee by gender, right? If my company
managed gender equality we'd be right at the limit if all the desks were full.
Maybe that's why the facilities guy gets cranky if people take over meeting
rooms for contractors or interns?

A certain online retailer of books and counterfeit electronics has slightly
larger bathrooms and a similar layout in its new buildings, but worse gender
equality. They may actually be in violation.

~~~
colanderman
Your assumption is correct. Men's and women's toilet facilities are counted
separately for each sex by OSHA. The exception is single-occupancy rooms,
which can count for either sex.

(It's not clear the exact algorithm one should use in counting a mixture of
multi- and single-person restrooms, but I would presume it's something like,
count all the men that can use your male restrooms, count all the women that
can use your female restrooms, and take everyone left over and see if they fit
is your unisex restrooms.)

------
hack_mmmm
2 years back We used to get a cabin office @Qualcomm for all Engineers same as
VPs. Now Staff Engineers and above still get cabin office and others have
moved to cubicles. We have a lab where most of us sit in the afternoon to
collaborate. I must say this is the only place where I saw in my career where
a fresh grad got cabin offices. It feels great to code in isolation
uninterrupted. It also feels great to collaborate in lab with other folks and
also code there.

~~~
neogodless
I searched "cabin office" on Google, but the results were largely about
offices in cabins. I have a feeling you mean something else. Would you mind
defining them for me?

To clarify, I'm not familiar with your usage of the word "cabin" in this
context.

~~~
praneshp
It's a regular room, nothing special (in terms of using the word "cabin"). 4
years ago at San Diego interns were 3 to a room, regular engineers were 2 per
room, and I guess at some point it became 1 per room.

Kind of useless for me though, because I spent almost 90% of my time in a lab
(and a large portion of engineers spend most of their time in a lab). The lab
is a large noisy room. with people next to each other. It was a good deal
though; if I had stayed past my internship and gotten comfortable enough to
write a lot of code before wanting to test it, I could've spent more time in
my office.

------
rwoodley
I've worked for financial firms for 31 years. Almost all of that time, I've
been a programmer on a trading desk sitting right next to traders. There is
constant noise and shouting. I can tune out a lot. EXCEPT: TV noise, and idle
chit chat like you'd have down at the pub. As long as people are focused on
work, I can tune it whatever they say. Strange.

------
DavidThi808
We mostly have 2 people/office. We would have done individual offices but the
office space we found to rent was perfect except the offices were larger and
so it was a LOT cheaper to use the existing build-out.

It is working well. People mostly are heads down getting their work done. So
add Windward Studios to the list where all developers get offices.

------
zodnas
All full-time employees at SAS have their own office.

------
bsimpson
At Google, it depends on which building you're in. I sit in an office with 3
other people. My manager sits in an open pod in the hallway.

------
Bahamut
I have my own office at Apple here in Cupertino (just a software
engineer)...I'm glad that almost all our teams are moving to Infinite Loop as
opposed to the new campus :) . Most of our offices hold two people though
(still better than open offices!).

~~~
orange_bear
I remember the IL buildings having almost exclusively single-occupant offices
and cubicles throughout the 2000's. In the last few years you can't even find
a parking spot out there. Maybe things will be better for you with people
shuffled to the new hell building.

------
neofrommatrix
Oracle does provide private offices in their Santa Clara location. This has
mostly to do with this being the old Sun Microsystems buildings. It might have
changed now, though after rapid expansion of their public cloud engineering
group.

------
Kluny
Automattic. But it's remote, you have to supply your own office. They
contribute $250 toward co-working space.

~~~
jtmarmon
What if you live in NYC where a coworking membership is around $500 a month
and an office $1000?

~~~
onion2k
It's contribution; it's not supposed to cover the full cost.

~~~
bdavisx
If it's your employer, they should be paying for the entire cost of your
office.

~~~
djmobley
If you're hired as a remote employee, basing yourself in one of the most
expensive cities in the world is your choice, not your employer's.

~~~
bdavisx
Good point, and I guess it would be up to the employee to negotiate more $ for
their office (if possible).

------
drfuchs
Adobe in San Jose. (At least it used to.)

~~~
rajeshp1986
They are in the process of dismantling those office and creating an open
office plan.

------
msukmanowsky
Parse.ly is 100% remote and I've got a pretty sweet home office :)

~~~
amorphid
In the USA... Given real estate prices in tech hubs, who can afford an office
space anymore, let alone private offices! I imagine working from home will
become the new normal. At least until the FCC allows ISPs to throttle Internet
connection speeds so much that ISDN lines start looking attractive. Hopefully
they make the phone company maintain those copper phone lines!

~~~
calafrax
this fcc comment is so uninformed. getting rid of net neutrality will make
service way better because you will be able to pay for a line with prioritized
access for video conferencing and remote presence. net neutrality is what
makes it impossible for individuals with a public isp connection to get the
same quality as corporations with their own private networks.

~~~
sand500
>net neutrality is what makes it impossible for individuals with a public isp
connection to get the same quality as corporations with their own private
networks.

Right, its definitely not the ISP monopoly/duopoly

~~~
calafrax
yep. all of those qos and traffic shaping features on routers don't actually
do anything. that is why it should be illegal for public isps to use them.
makes sense.

------
rdiddly
Intel still has the old-school high-walled cubicles in some places. But
gradually, floor by floor, building by building, they've been renovating, and
you know what that means! More openness. To their credit the new motif is 1)
more aesthetically pleasing, and 2) not TOTALLY open.

In other words, not this fuckin' nightmare... [http://workdesign.com/wp-
content/uploads/2016/06/Open-plan-o...](http://workdesign.com/wp-
content/uploads/2016/06/Open-plan-office-014.jpg) ...but more like a range
going from this... [https://media.glassdoor.com/l/ce/49/d7/6c/intel-
office.jpg](https://media.glassdoor.com/l/ce/49/d7/6c/intel-office.jpg) ...to
this... [http://media.glassdoor.com/m/2d/0e/af/40/desk-with-a-
view.jp...](http://media.glassdoor.com/m/2d/0e/af/40/desk-with-a-view.jpg)
...and even this... [https://media.glassdoor.com/l/17/25/41/7c/intel-
office.jpg](https://media.glassdoor.com/l/17/25/41/7c/intel-office.jpg)

------
nxc18
Esri gives just about everyone their own office; aside from people displaced
by moves or visiting, I've yet to encounter a programmer without one.

~~~
infinitone
Another Esri HNer i see!

------
dsfyu404ed
If your work is classified you almost certainly get an office.

------
programmarchy
I worked for a successful medium sized business called SpeakWrite early in my
career that specialized in voice transcription for the legal industry. The
company was founded by a former lawyer, and the office culture was very
traditional. The software team was treated with respect, paid well, and
everyone had their own office. It was great! Having worked in tech/startup
culture since then, I much prefer the traditional office culture. Now I work
remotely as a consultant and have my own office, but miss working on a closely
knit team.

------
Balgair
Most DoD and DoE jobs/contractors have personal offices. In fact, I've never
seen one that doesn't at least have a cube-farm and most just have a personal
office and then meeting rooms and then lab-space, depending on the job. Cubes
are terrible in their own right, but it's better than an open office by a lot.
At least you have somewhere to put pictures of your kids up at eye level.

------
thehardsphere
I would hope most companies that consider software to be their core business
give programmers offices, even if they have to share those offices with
another person on the same team. Most companies that do not often consider
programmers secondary to their core business, which is a good reason not to
work there if you have a choice.

~~~
dmoy
I mean I would hope so too, but it appears to be patently not true. Thus the
ask HN question, where can one find these mythical offices.

~~~
thehardsphere
Well, the only place where a non-programmer would treat the idea that
programmers should have offices with incredulity would be a place that doesn't
value software as its core business.

I mean, most "programmers" don't work for software companies; many of them are
employed by banks and insurance companies. It's natural for that to be treated
weird there.

~~~
dmoy
"the only place where a non-programmer would treat the idea that programmers
should have offices with incredulity would be a place that doesn't value
software as its core business"

But this is also not true, see e.g. Facebook, Google.

------
tibbon
At least give me my own 64sqft cube, and then have some decent lighting. I'd
far rather live in a cubefarm than be rubbing elbows with the person beside
me. It's not perfect, but having some degree of "my space" is really
essential.

Oddly, I had my own office when I was working in IT at 17, but now it's harder
to find.

------
carapace
I'm literally about to go talk to recruiters and I'm going to try it: I'll
take $20,000 off of my pay if co will provide an office with a door I can
close.

I'll report back what they say.

I just recently was working in an open office and the difference between
daytime and evening (after everyone else left) was dramatic.

------
coderjames
Universal Avionics provides their Engineers private offices. It was important
to the founder of the company, so when a new building was constructed it was
specifically arranged to provide as many offices as possible, even if some are
internal (no outside window).

------
TallGuyShort
Microsoft comes to mind? I've only been in a couple of buildings in the
Seattle campus, but it was the typical open-air shared desks that you see in
many other software companies recently. Are they known for using desks
otherwise?

------
mindcrime
When the day comes that Fogbeam Labs has an actual office, and employees, I
absolutely intend to make sure that everybody has a private office with a
door. Unfortunately, I can't say when that will be.

------
rajeshp1986
I don't think any decent size company could afford to do that in Bay Area. The
real estate prices are too high to give personal offices to everyone and
that's why open office plans are adopted.

------
matheweis
I shared a two person office at the university that I worked at before my
current job. If that sounds like a good deal in exchange for 50% of the
industry salary, I believe they're hiring... :)

------
nhumrich
The book peopleware argues for the middle ground. Shared offices. Rooms with a
door, with 3-4 people. You have quick collaboration, but also are closed off
from unrelated distraction.

------
omg2k
MathWorks (Natick, MA).

------
alok-g
Qualcomm

~~~
tesmar2
If you are in QRC, T, N or S. I think the newer buildings are open office
plans.

------
pawanpe
[https://www.mathworks.com/](https://www.mathworks.com/)

------
bebop
Everyone at ESRI has their own office.

------
potus_putin
Programmers dont have individual offices ? How can you think with others
distracting you ?

------
factotum
Reynolds and Reynolds in Houston.

~~~
stefantheard
BUT! This comes with some caveats... check glassdoor. Be cautious and don't
undervalue yourself.

------
ozzmotik
i had my own office at cPanel, albeit a small one but it was a pleasant
personal space.

------
kk3399
Epic systems

~~~
hitekker
If you're speaking of the Healthcare Giant based in Wisconsin, I believe you
share an office with one other person.

Or at least on the Verona campus. It's been a while since I've been around
those parts.

~~~
thehardsphere
Sharing with one person is still better than a cube or open plan.

~~~
charsifood
Or, depending on the person, much much worse.

~~~
samstave
In the late 90s I shrared an office with a guy, and he was great and really
nice - we both liked to work with the lights out...

But he had a very peculiar look to his face, like a charicature. So when we
would spin round in our chairs to discuss something, he'd be talking to me
about something very serious about work and I would start to giggle.

He would say "what why are you laughing?" And I would have to say things like
"in sorry something you said just reminded my of something funny"

I had a really hard time maintaining a straight face around him - I felt so
bad about it.

------
ryanSrich
Work for companies that support remote work. You'll always have a private
office.

------
dacracot
Lawrence Livermore Nat'l Laboratory. Everyone has an office with a door.

------
rspeer
Luminoso, a natural language processing company in Cambridge, MA.

------
meddlepal
PTC in Needham, MA does if you're on the ProE/Creo team

------
rurban
Cpanel, Houston Texas

------
bostik
We have team offices at Smarkets.

------
danesparza
You mentioned it in the question already, but when I worked at Microsoft _as a
contractor_ I got an office.

------
suhith
Fog Creek Software does iirc

------
jps359
ibm

------
orange_bear
Apple placed me in an experimental building where they were changing the
interior design constantly, trying to decide how to design their new "space
ship" building. The whole time, I fumed at no longer having an office and
having to work in an open office design. I could not focus due to audio and
visual interruptions while I worked (programmer) in the open office spaces.
But no one ever asked me for my opinion about the experimental open office
environments!

Now this: [https://www.bizjournals.com/sanjose/news/2017/08/08/apple-
pa...](https://www.bizjournals.com/sanjose/news/2017/08/08/apple-park-
employees-floor-plan-hq-spaceship-aapl.html) "Apple staffers reportedly
rebelling against open office plan at new $5 billion HQ"

Glad I wasn't the only coder there who utterly despised the move to the open
office design.

~~~
pawadu
So what do the _designers_ think of the new office?

I once was at a place were designers always had the last word (maybe because
CEO was an architect), hence their new offices looked like a much cheaper
version of Starbucks. With fewer couches and the few walls that made it were
all made of glass.

The company is no longer around. These days just nearby their old offices
brings back horrible memories.

~~~
puranjay
Designing seems like a collaborative thing. I'm a writer and nothing peeves me
more than open offices.

Some tasks require isolation. Writing is one of them. I reckon programming is
similar.

------
starbuxman
Wouldn't it be more appealing for companies to allow their employees to work
remotely?

------
orange_bear
Thanks for the info! At my last workplace (Apple), the department had brought
in a ton of H1B visa workers from body shops and I'm skeptical about if it was
legal. They were all crammed elbow-to-elbow in bullpen cubicles. As a
contractor at the time, I sat on a bench in the hallway because there were no
free bullpen cubes!! The bathroom urinals always had pools of urine beneath
them, due (in part) to excessive use. The toilet seats were always urinated
on. Oh, good times.

~~~
colanderman
> The toilet seats were always urinated on.

I don't get this; this happened at my workplace too, until we installed a
coded lock on the restroom (which was otherwise accessible to anyone in the
building). What kind of boor has a professional job but can't piss in a foot-
diameter hole and is too lazy to clean up when he does so?

~~~
orange_bear
Hate to say it, but I caught a guy one day after he completely ruined the
toilet seat and it was an Indian H1B contractor. No I didn't go chase him down
at that point.

Please don't ban my account, that's true and anecdotal - 75%+ of my coworkers
in that department were Indian so maybe it was just the odds.

~~~
dang
No, you can't comment like that here, and yes we've banned your account.

No reasonable idea of civility
([https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html](https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html))
would include "anecdotes" about the grossness of other races' or nations'
bathroom habits. I'm flummoxed that this became necessary to state explicitly,
but I guess everything happens if you moderate an internet forum long enough.

------
holbue
Who else read "... gives programers coffees"? :-D

PS: Seriously, free coffee is more important to me than an office. I like open
working environments.

