
Hell is a stylish shared office space - alphadevx
http://www.alphadevx.com/a/512-Hell-is-a-stylish-shared-office-space
======
doctorRetro
I spent nine and a half years with my own office (right out of school, too; I
was quite lucky to have that) and while it wasn't much, it was mine. I then
moved to a much better position with a more open concept. Not ultra-trendy-
start-up open, but still with nine people in one room. The effect on my
ability to concentrate has been very noticeable. If there is more than one
conversation going on in the room, I need to get up and leave until it's over;
I can't accomplish anything. I wouldn't go back to my previous position for
anything, but I do miss my office.

------
smoe
"Instead [at lunch] you will sit with your own company teammates, so that you
can talk freely about your current projects and issues."

What seems more hellish to me, is teammates that can't shut up constantly
talking about work during breaks.

While I see problems with shared office spaces, exchange with or people from
sometimes completely different domains during breaks is the biggest plus for
me. At least from experience in Switzerland and Colombia.

~~~
dijit
I apologise I'm super guilty of this, I don't like small talk and share next
to no common interests with colleagues.

What would you prefer?

------
tomcooks
I sympathize with the author, open spaces were invented to function as a
hipster panopticon and to maximize landlord gains.

But these rants sound very passive aggressive. Maybe it's a cultural
difference which makes it harder for me to understand, but can't you just ask
to turn on/off the heating, ask the dog owner not to let their animal invade
your space, ask the office owner to alert you about repairs, etc.?

A simple solution i found to this problem is to work at old people cafes, or
better yet in a retirement house.

Extra cozy, extra safe, nobody disturbs you, you get free cake/coffee/tea,
freelance gigs and the occasional invite to date their daughters

~~~
alphadevx
I have complained about some of these issues, but been ignored. I mentioned
that in the blog entry. I really don't think it should be my job to roam
around the building, asking people to keep the noise down, take their dogs
back, stop hammering etc...

* Edit for typo

------
megaman22
I can't imagine such a work situation appealing to anybody other than extreme
penny-pinchers, or maybe fresh grads, straight out of colleges. This sounds
exactly like trying to get work done in a university library or study hall. If
you've never known anything better, or you're the kind of person that needs
that social stimuli, I can imagine you might think it was normal enough; I
couldn't do it then; I'd work alone in my room or buried in the stacks. And
now? Forget about it.

~~~
markbnj
I work for a fully-remote company and a number of our engineers choose to work
from coworking spaces like WeWork. It's entirely their decision and I guess
they miss the atmosphere and social interaction of an office.

~~~
alanfalcon
Or they have kids (or spouses) too immature to respect the sanctity of the
home office during working hours.

~~~
mathgeek
Not everyone has a home with a dedicated space to put a home office, either.
When you have to work out of your bedroom, a distinct office away from home
quickly becomes useful. Not every problem with remote work and distractions is
a result of personality flaws.

------
diiaann
We have a "private" office in a WeWork. For me the worst part is the desk
itself, it's totally substandard as a task desk. Same with the chairs, people
joke about the college analogy but I had better desking as a college student.
Secondly, a lot of the interior decisions are questionable, such as the
pendant light that casts glare on my monitor.

Also the music in the common areas is irritating and I even like some of the
songs they play.

~~~
mighty_bander
The WeWork environment is a nightmare. Fishtank offices, music they must buy
by the MB blasted all over the place... and they charge as much as a nice
private office in some corner of a larger business. All to be surrounded by
hipsters with two-person marketing firms and no business plan. I assume
they're going to help with networking. A basement is an infinitely better
workspace.

------
olivermarks
I was just meeting/working at the largest WeWork anywhere, in Moorgate London.
I like the atmosphere, my 'but' would be noise levels. It only takes one
loud/noisy neighbour and your concentration is gone. Multiples of that makes
it hard to have a meeting, where you may well also be disrupting someone
else's day by making too much noise.

Therefore more sound proofing is needed...

~~~
jclardy
I work remote and regularly work from coffee shops where the noise level is
high. I find I am quite able to block out the noise/distractions fine in that
environment.

I also go into the office occasionally (which is an open layout) and my
productivity plummets. Less so because of the noise, but more so because the
conversations being had around me have some relevance to me. And if I can help
clarify something than I will interject. But the problem for me isn't noise,
it is relevant noise where I subconsciously listen for something useful. Also
with that you have people coming up to your and asking questions, because
there is no indicator of "I'm busy right now" like a closed door in an office.

------
acd
I think open shared office spaces are an effect of high rents in Sillicon
valley and major capital cities. Startups having limited capital rarther
spending it on employees salaries getting more head count. Shared space is not
effective for concentrating during coding.

I doubt shared spaces has been evaluated for effectiveness versus personal
office. Shared spaces may be a cause of people working remote.

~~~
pavel_lishin
Is there any advantage to a shared space? It seems like the sort of solution
where you're working solo anyway, so there's no reason to have the team all
there...

~~~
cwkoss
For small teams, the ability for people to jump into a conversation which
began without them can have value.

If you are a 6-person team, and when two engineers say "Hey, we'll probably
need a design for this", the designer can hear this (if not in deep
concentration) and join the conversation without any slack messages needed.
This sort of 'free triage' has some value, not sure if it's net advantage when
accounting for distraction costs though.

Price is probably the clearest advantage: you can fit more people into an
office without walls.

~~~
pavel_lishin
Sorry, I didn't mean an open office space - I mean literally a shared space,
where you hotel desks, etc., and are surrounded by non-employees.

~~~
cwkoss
If you're solo programming, can be nice to have other people to have lunch
with or discuss technical problems, but depends a lot on the atmosphere of the
shared space and how sociable you are.

------
FussyZeus
It seems like every study and every data point is all saying the same thing:
with exceptions made for meetings and occasional gatherings _when physical
proximity actually matters_ the vast majority of tech workers prefer to
telecommute themselves, are more productive when telecommuting, it's obviously
cheaper for the company to not rent absurd amounts of space where they can pay
employees to be physically present and less productive, etc.

So why exactly are we still having offices at all? Seems like if I were going
to start a business today, I'd occasionally rent a meeting room and otherwise
not have any real estate actually connected to it, aside from maybe a server
room in my home or something. Why are we so obsessed with having physical
locations for companies? Is this just a fad that won't die?

------
jack9
I was very impressed by the WeWork offices in southern california. Modern,
maze-like, soundproofed rooms, conference areas spread around (multiple
floors). It was a little cumbersome to get in to with all the security, but
was otherwise delightful.

------
gxs
One unintended consequence of cramming 3-4x the amount of people into a
building designed in the 60s/70s for offices is the influx of traffic. On top
of that, parking becomes very problematic.

On top of that bathrooms and kitchens are harder to maintain, though
admittedly those can be more easily remodeled.

May not be a huge deal in the city, but definitely in a lot of office parks in
the 'burbs I've been in.

~~~
QAPereo
Silicon Valley: Welcome To The Gongsi Fong.

------
otakucode
People working from home is not a failure of modern office design. It is a
failure of the core concept of the office itself. It no longer has value to
offer. Originally, factories were necessary because physical colocation of
workers was physically necessary. It was a sacrifice, an overhead taken on
that created its own problems but which paid for them in overall benefit.
Those benefits are now gone. Offices are now dead weight, an inefficiency that
will be eliminated (as will be the unfortunate few barnacles who cling to
their underbelly and previously solved some of the problems offices invented).
Maybe not tomorrow, but eventually they will. They destroy value, and add
none.

------
sbov
I've never worked at a WeWork, but I've worked at shared office spaces before
and I never had issues with the other people renting offices. Maybe it's the
clientele WeWork attracts.

------
secstate
Not that I disagree with the specifics here, but I think there's a happy
medium to find. Individual boxed offices for every employee is not efficient
use of space most of time. While it's popular to kvetch about open plan
offices now, when the pendulum swings back there's plenty to complain about
the isolation and dead air of a private room (most are no bigger than
closets).

Personally, I think the move towards working from home is tremendous. Perhaps
it is a failure of office, but maybe that's okay. Offices are something of a
hold-over from the days of the Empire State Building and insurance companies
with 10,000 employees processing hand written forms. Maybe open plan offices
with the expectation that most folks wont spend all their time there is a
better default?

~~~
advisedwang
This blog post is complaining about office space shared with other companies
in the Style of WeWork, not open plan office spaces.

~~~
secstate
My bad ... I tldr the whole thing and didn't get to the WeWork part :(
#readerfail

------
btbuildem
| Overhead lights that switch off after a certain time if no motion is
detected. I have even had this happen to me in the toilets :-)

Ah, so you're the guy on his phone in the toilet, occupying a stall for way
longer than necessary, while others have to wait. Thanks, buddy.

~~~
smelendez
I've seen this too.

I think it's probably an ADA violation, because it must cause completely
unnecessary problems for people with mobility issues (not everyone can easily
wave their arms around over their head while using the restroom).

Edit: I actually know nothing about the legal nuances of the ADA, but it
certainly seems to violate the generally understood spirit of the law.

~~~
sleepybrett
We have this in our normal office, but it isn't motion detection it's sound
and it's only in "power saving" mode after normal office hours. So if you are
working late and going to be in the bathroom for more than 5 minutes you have
to remember to clear your throat every few minutes.

