
The Price of (Dev) Happiness: Part One - joshuacc
http://blog.fogcreek.com/the-price-of-dev-happiness-part-one/
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edw519

                ========================
                | Interesting | Boring |
                |    Work     |  Work  |
      ==================================
      |  Nice  ||   Heaven    |  Read  |
      | Office ||             |   HN.  |
      |--------||-------------+--------|
      |  Bad   ||   No one    |  Kill  | 
      | Office ||   cares.    |   me.  |
      ==================================

~~~
gte910h
I disagree. I've had jobs where I can't think because the building is too hot,
even though the work was interesting, etc.

Neither of these lines are binary either. I've been on projects which were
kinda, but not really interesting, etc.

Lastly, your health makes that a much bigger deal. Your back starts hurting,
you want a solution, which may entail a job change.

~~~
mgkimsal
too hot? I wouldv'e committed a small crime for heat. I came in to my office
in July 2007 and it was 62f. It warmed up to about 66 after I ran some space
heaters. (this was in the US, not the southern hemisphere!) :)

~~~
gte910h
You can locally heat up a cube. There isn't really an effective cooling
substitute that's localized.

I would have killed for 62F. My house is 68F year round (I work at home now).
(My bedroom is probably 64-66 or so).

~~~
mgkimsal
My fingers couldn't type or mouse very effectively. 100+ people worked in
frigid temps so a few people on the other side of the wall could have mid 70s
- the thermostat was on their side of the wall. :/

~~~
sethg
Obviously, what you needed was a heated keyboard:

[http://www.engadget.com/2007/05/23/heated-keyboard-keeps-
fin...](http://www.engadget.com/2007/05/23/heated-keyboard-keeps-fingers-
toasty-whilst-typing/)

------
JimmyL
An old company of mine had Nightingale CXOs
(<http://www.nightingalechairs.com/cxo_home.html>) as the standard issue
developer chair. I remember the first few days I was there, not really getting
it - the thing is this complex-looking chair that you'd think would be
infinitely comfortable, and mine...wasn't.

And then around day three, just as I was finishing all my HR stuff and the
get-to-know-you tours (and starting on my first project), one more person came
around and introduced themselves as the local ergonomics advisor, and
explained that they were here to fit my chair. I then had to watch the Flash
movie on how to adjust my chair, and play with the little 3D rendering of it
(during which time, the visitor was watching how I moved). After ten minutes
of this they stopped me, and proceeded to adjust five or six settings on the
chair (a few angles, the arm width, the pan distance, etc.).

Upon sitting down again, it was like I was sitting on a cloud, and I
understood what you get with a thousand-dollar office chair. In an ideal
world, it wouldn't take someone who took a course in chair-adjustment (they
had a rep come in for two days to teach the advisors how to perfectly fit the
chair to the desk and person) - but damn, does the system work well.

~~~
gte910h
I found the aeron's nothing that complicated to adjust properly, but man, was
that stuff worth it.

~~~
jseliger
I'm sitting in the Herman Miller Embody, which is vastly harder to adjust
properly, at least for me. I've actually been meaning to finish a very long
review of the chair; maybe this'll inspire me to do so and submit to HN.

~~~
gte910h
I don't mean to come off wrong, but did you read the actual manual? Most HM
chairs have a nice procedure to adjust them.

------
nkurz
I find it disturbing that the author of this piece is having his on-topic
responses censored:

    
    
      richarmstrong 5 hours ago | link [dead]  
      You are not alone. I wrote that blog post while sitting on 
      a Humanscale Freedom Saddle Seat stool ($300). I 
      considered getting into it about Aerons, but thought 
      better of it.
      Plenty of folks here dislike them, too, and have the 
      choice of any chair they want us to order.
    	
      richarmstrong 5 hours ago | link [dead]
      I'd love to do that, but our offices are glass-doored, so 
      not sound-proofed, though that's a good idea.
    

His submissions are both dead as well:
<http://news.ycombinator.com/submitted?id=richarmstrong>

What's happening here?

~~~
nfriedly
Most likely, his account got marked as spam by the automated system. I'm
pretty sure PG can fix it, not sure if anyone else can.

------
krschultz
The real piece of math missing from this is the cost of the real estate. I'd
take a cheap chair and desk in NYC over a $1000 chair at a $1500 desk in the
suburbs. The surroundings matter as much as the inside of the office. But a
lot of companies move to the suburbs because rent becomes prohibitive on a
large scale.

------
pasbesoin
Waiting for the next post:

 _Next: the real cost of private offices._

You should include the cost of effective insulation/sound-proofing. (I've
seen/heard it done reasonably well with expanding foam during wall
construction.)

P.S. Hey, folks, the original author, Rich Armstrong (richarmstrong), actually
replied in a response this comment, but you killed it off -- it's dead, now.

<http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2868730>

Maybe a mod could unkill it? Seems unfair; it was a perfectly legitimate
response. I'll copy/paste it (presuming permission):

 _I'd love to do that, but our offices are glass-doored, so not sound-proofed,
though that's a good idea._

~~~
potatolicious
Sometimes I feel like I'm the only one who doesn't like private offices. It
just seems like a separation between myself and the rest of the team. I
actually _like_ open seating arrangements.

When I need some serious concentration and can tolerate no distractions, a
solid pair of noise-canceling headphones does the trick.

~~~
corin_
Personally I love them - we're a small company, only six of us in the office
(a few others dotted around elsewhere), and private rooms are great. Most of
the time we leave our doors open and can chat from the hall, or shout to each
other - but even then, it's nice having a bit more personal space than if they
were in the same room.

We work in publishing and marketing though, so essentially we work on
different things except when two or more of us come together on a specific
topic, at which point we can either sit in one person's office or go into the
conference room. Maybe we would feel differently if we were all developers and
therefore had a different style of working together?

~~~
rdl
What I'd like is private offices with huge doors (double doors, or rollup
doors, or french door wall, or whatever), all facing common "courtyard" areas
for teams, and then also having doors to utility/access/etc. hallways.

I have no idea how you'd build this cost effectively except illegally inside a
huge open warehouse (2-3 story clear-span space).

------
pedoh
The big takeaway for me from this article is "treat your employees well". It
may be that some devs prefer sitting in a beanbag chair with a 13" laptop. Do
you think Fog Creek is going to say no? Heck no. They're going to do whatever
it takes to keep your developers (and all employees) happy. We are at work a
huge percentage of our lives. Not being happy at work is depressing,
particularly when the employing company can take steps like this to make the
environment welcoming and positive.

I think that from an employer perspective, sometimes it's the "little" things
that pile up and really make a difference. For example, how much does having
bagels, cream cheese, coffee, and fresh fruit available every morning really
cost a company? In the grand scheme of things, probably not very much. But for
those people who need something to kickstart their day, offering this sort of
freebie is going to make them happy.

In my opinion, the desk setup as described above would make me FAR happier
than free breakfast. Knowing that a company does this for their employees
would certainly push that company to the top of the list of companies to work
for.

------
msluyter
Personally, I hate Aeron chairs with a passion. Obviously, the overall point
here is to keep developers happy, so I'd presume FogCreek allows developers to
opt for different/better chairs. I just don't understand why these are
considered the pinnacle of comfort.

Is it just me? Am I the only person who finds everything about them to
hideously uncomfortable, from the jabby knife in the back lumbar support to
the circulation killing front steel bar that makes it impossible to perch on
the edge if you so desire? </rant>

~~~
zr52002
Try the Herman Miller Mirra, it's a lower chair in their line but the back
structure makes it far superior to the Aeron.

~~~
georgieporgie
I've read that the plastic chair back feels good at first, but gets
uncomfortable. I seem to recall something about H.M. listing it as rated for
three hours (?), making it a "task" chair rather than a "work" chair (if I
understand the nomenclature). What's your experience been with it?

~~~
clscott
I have been using a Mirra fulltime for more than 2 years. When my former
employer was getting new offices and furniture, I piggybacked on their chair
order so I could get a discount on two chairs for the home office.

I now work from home and think it was one of the best investments I've made in
myself. The chair is very comfortable and they adjust very well for tall or
very short people (my wife).

Rating: Would buy again

~~~
georgieporgie
Thanks for that.

Can you compare it to any other chairs? Most of us (myself included, with the
Aeron) love their first ergo-chair, making it hard to compare them. :-)

~~~
clscott
In the past I have used an Aeron for about a year. The Mirra comes very close
to the adjustability and I would say is just as comfortable.

------
mathattack
There are two unwritten assumptions in this post:

1 - The company focuses on people as appreciable assets, as opposed to costs
to be minimized.

2 - There is not diminishing returns for chasing the best.

Where this is true and recognized, companies don't nickel and dime employees.
It is usually true in the best recruiter of each talent focused industry. Like
them or not, this is in part why Goldman Sachs and McKinsey succeed, as well
as top software firms.

Once you view people as costs to be minimized (think the auto industry) or
there is diminishing returns on individual excellence (think Wal-mart) then
this system breaks down.

------
acangiano
I expressed similar thoughts in the past:
[http://programmingzen.com/2010/12/28/give-your-
programmers-p...](http://programmingzen.com/2010/12/28/give-your-programmers-
professional-tools/) It just doesn't make sense to cheap out on these things.
If you do because you can't afford it for every developer, then you don't have
enough money to employ that many developers.

~~~
mattdeboard
Wait, sorry, are you saying that a company shouldn't hire a person if they
can't afford top-end office equipment? Or is this only for developers? I think
that's silly & unrealistic, and am hoping it's just hyperbole to make a point.

(edit: I don't actually disagree with your general point, that better tools ==
higher productivity == better return on that developer salary. However,
implying the cost of buying top-end gear for a dev should be a sunk cost isn't
fair or realistic. Especially when the business has other employees who don't
touch emacs or eclipse but still sit at a desk all day working on a computer.
)

~~~
angelbob
Probably primarily for developers. A $100/mo investment to get more out of
your developers (who cost at least $30k, and usually $100k+) isn't a problem.
If you're looking at much cheaper office staff, you can presumably pay less to
make them more productive since hiring more of them is cheaper (measured in
Aerons).

~~~
jackowayed
How do you manage the differentiation without the less special classes having
some resentment? There are some costs that they'd likely understand (person
who spends all day in email and Word objectively does not need as good of a
computer as a developer), but how do you tell someone that they're not worthy
of the same desk/chair that a developer is? What happens if there's a spare
developer chair that they start sitting in? Do you ask for it back when you
hire a new dev?

I'm not saying it's impossible, especially as the company and grows and there
may be less direct contact between the departments, but I definitely see some
issues that could arise.

~~~
nknight
A developer who plants themselves in their chair for a 12-hour hacking run and
barely moves in that time objectively needs a more ergonomic environment than
the 9-4:30-ers that spend most of their time standing around the water cooler
or coffee maker.

~~~
keithpeter
I'd rephrase this a bit...

I am a mere gadfly, a dilettante, and I have to get up and walk around to
think, draw, sketch, scribble, look out of the window, focus on the horizon.
At work, I spend a lot of time talking to groups of people, and moving things
about. I'm actually unable to sit at a keyboard and type for more than an
hour. So I use a kitchen chair in my home office and at work we have cheapo
semi-adjustable computer type chairs, and three year old Windows boxes with
smallish LCD monitors.

If someone else at work really did sit or stand at their keyboard for 12 hours
straight, I'd have no problem at all with them having a fancy chair, because
they would have my admiration and sympathy.

...might sell the idea a bit better to the support staff

------
AhtiK
Interesting that the mouse is considered as something as "up to $70". After
you get used to high-dpi gaming mouse you can't even work properly with <$100
models.

Just like moving to SSD felt like a revolution, for me moving up to a gaming
grade mouse has been.. irreplaceable.

The precision and speed for any mouse-oriented task saves quite some time and
especially gives a great feeling of having better contact with the screen.
_Highly_ reccommended.

It takes a few days to get used to moving your hand a lot less than before but
think how much less strain!

Current setup: Logitech G9X and Razer exactmat. Previous mouse was Razer
Lachesis but ergonomically it was somewhat crap.

~~~
joshuacc
Based on your recommendation, I think I may have to try a gaming mouse.

However, the model you mentioned is currently listed as $71.99 on Amazon. Were
you thinking of a different model, or have prices just dropped since you
bought it?

~~~
AhtiK
Ah yes, it's the same. I guess the prices have dropped, it was bought almost
two years ago.

By the way, gaming mouse usually requires a good mouse pad in order to have
the effect. Razer has a good selection, maybe others as well.

~~~
imeikas
Also we have VAT ;)

------
iandanforth
The cost of the workstation should be doubled when calculating the cost over 5
years. I don't know anyone happily working on a 5 year old box. 2.5, sure, but
not 5.

------
seanalltogether
How many dev shops still give everyone workstations? Our company is entirely
on laptops and I don't know a single person here that wants a workstation.

~~~
kenjackson
I can't do serious dev work on a laptop. Too underpowered. Everyone here gets
a laptop, but it's for working in bed, or on the road, at your child's birth,
etc... But for day to day dev work, a high-end workstation is a fair bit more
productive. At least for the type of dev work we do.

~~~
phuff
I sure hope they give you some time off at your child's birth... :)

~~~
mgkimsal
Didn't he just have some time off nine months ago?

------
grannyg00se
That's all very nice, but I'd rather just stay home. I get to keep using my
own highly personalized office space and avoid commuting. Employer get to save
$5000 and reduce office space requirements.

------
ikarous
I wish my company had similar sentiments. I sit in a darkened corner with the
lights turned off. The only thing I can see is an unilluminated beige wall.
It's very depressing.

I brought in my own chair (a used Steelcase Leap) and my own keyboard. That
helped a lot. Even so, I still have to get up frequently throughout the day so
that I don't get back or shoulder pain. When I do, I get suspicious looks from
folks who think I'm not working hard enough.

The irony is that I work at home on my own time because I'm more productive
there.

~~~
stewiecat
The only thing I work on that my job provided is the laptop, which they
purchased for me after realizing my own was a bit too old. External monitor,
mouse, keyboard, stand, etc. all came from home.

------
blago
Or spend the $6,174.00 for:

Flight to Thailand: $2000

Rent a beach house: $3500

Rent a motorcycle: $674

eat, swim, snorkel ≈ $0

and work from a tropical paradise for 4 months. Keep your toys for the kids.
I'll go get an oil massage.

------
synnik
One size does not fit all.

I prefer a 99 dollar ergonomic chair, as sitting and standing both exacerbate
my bad hips. I prefer 3 22" monitors at half the cost of a 30". I prefer total
resolution available, not size of the monitor.

I just saved him $1500 bucks, and I'm happier than I would be if I was forced
into their setup.

~~~
gte910h
I'm sure he'd be happy to buy that as well.

Edit: He honestly says that elsewhere in the replies (user spolsky).

------
paganel
I don't know if anyone mentioned this yet (I haven't read through all the
comments), but having the headquarters located somewhere in an interesting
area (preferable downtown, and I don't mean the downtown of a dying city like
Detroit) and allowing your employees to take their 45min-1h lunch break where-
ever they want (in this way taking full advantage of the
cafes/restaurants/beautiful buildings supposedly surrounding their work-place)
it's also a very nice thing to have.

For me, at least, it allows me to clear my head and come back fresh to my desk
full of new ideas and _joie de vivre_. I think what companies like Google end
up doing, by keeping their employees locked-up in beautiful golden cages even
during launch-breaks is detrimental in the long run.

------
BasDirks
The price of Hacker happiness: an old calculator or other programmable device.

------
jseliger
One question to the writer, if you happen to be reading this: Why "AirTouch
Adjustable sit/stand desk and non-moving side desk – $1738 from Steelcase"
instead of Series 7 desks, which I think get mentioned elsewhere on your blog
or Joel on Software?

And do those desks have memory, so you can move it from one position (seating)
to another (standing) consistently?

~~~
rdl
I wish there were an adjustable desk with a glass top; I think the geekdesk
kits might work with the ikea glass tops, but I'm not sure.

------
Jem
I had no idea that some people like to code standing up; why is this? (Genuine
curiosity, someone enlighten me please :))

~~~
Revisor
There is a lot of discussions about this on Hacker News and generally people
who work standing are happy about it.

See eg <http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=2828948>

For more
[http://www.hnsearch.com/search#request/submissions&q=sta...](http://www.hnsearch.com/search#request/submissions&q=standing+desk&sortby=points+desc)

~~~
T-hawk
Just don't confuse the correlation and causation. Those who stand do so
because they like it. It doesn't automatically mean that everyone who tries
standing likes it.

------
synack
All I really need to be happy is a comfy couch or hammock and a Macbook. The
rest is superfluous.

------
tedkalaw
I wonder how the AirTouch desks compare to the GeekDesk. I'm really interested
in trying out the standing/sitting thing, and those two seem to be the really
big ones. Does anyone have any experience with either of them?

------
Void_
Clean desk. Priceless.

------
domador
Personally, I'd add a walking treadmill to this list. It could double the
total cost, though (depending on the model, of course).

------
eterps
So, how does the airtouch cope with the cables to your workstation? Or is it
intended to be used with laptops?

~~~
tghw
I leave my tower on the floor next to the desk and all of the cables are long
enough to reach even when it's at standing height. There is a tray below the
back edge of the desk that you can rest smaller objects on, like a USB hub. I
believe they also make a bracket that attaches to the underside of the desk
that can hold your tower, if you need.

------
kozo
what i cant understand in my workplace is that the admin dept has this very
nice comfy chairs and yet the IT dept has this very old non-ergonomic chair
that you would buy a backrest for it.

------
wheels
What I always find a little bit suspect about these posts – especially from
FogCreek – is that it's really, "The Price of Dev Happiness As Long As You
Define Happiness The Way Your Boss (Me) Does".

I prefer sitting cross-legged with a 13" laptop on a mat on the floor. I've
had most of the things mentioned in the article and prefer my mat on the
floor, thank you very much. But I'm just a random example.

More of what I'm getting at is that individual work preferences and your own
brand of "happiness" goes beyond choosing your own keyboard. There's always
something a bit smug and one-size-fits-all about the FogCreek posts about
their work environment (which honestly sounds like it'd make me go absolutely
bonkers).

~~~
spolsky
I love the way people on the Internet always find a way to misinterpret every
post in the worst possible way, no matter how little sense they make.

After reading a detailed article about how we spend over $5000 to make sure
our developers are comfortable at work, do you really think that we then CHAIN
them to an Aeron chair and REQUIRE that they use 30" monitors even if they
prefer sitting cross-legged on the floor with a 13" laptop?

OK, maybe you believe that. We have bought beanbags and those big bouncy balls
for people. We have bought Embody chairs for the rare person who doesn't like
a (properly fitted) Aeron chair. If anyone wanted a 13" laptop instead of a
30" monitor, you'd say the word and in 5 minutes you'd have a 13" laptop.

So, this impression you have of Fog Creek as a veal farm with identical
programmers all being chained to their identical, Joel-Spolsky-Favored desks
is entirely in your own imagination. It sort of reminds me of when I blogged
about how we have free lunch and a bunch of people whined about how they don't
like to eat with their co-workers. That's nice, some people don't, and that's
fine. I never said that the free lunch was mandatory. It's almost bizarre to
assume that a company that bends over backwards to make people happy and
productive at work is actually some kind of evil plot that would "make you go
absolutely bonkers."

~~~
wheels
_After reading a detailed article about how we spend [...] do you really think
that we then CHAIN them to an Aeron chair [...]_

The place that I worked that had such nice equipment basically did exactly
that: you were given your standard issue equipment with virtually zero
flexibility (amusingly other than keyboard and mouse, just like your setup).

That said, the impression mostly comes from the way that you write about the
place. You use a lot of absolute terms. There's a lot of talk about _best_ and
_ideal_ and _happy_ and then very precise definitions of those things. This
gives readers the impression that while you have a very luxurious office, that
it's also one that's quite rigid.

Honestly, I'd be surprised if that wholly misses the mark. You're obviously a
really smart guy that wants to do well by your employees, and good on you for
that. But it also sounds like you're running a grand experiment at FogCreek
where you're (mostly by fiat) deciding what you think is best for a company's
culture. That may actually produce a place that for the type of folks that get
hired there really clicks. I don't think I'd be one of those sorts.

~~~
rcthompson
It seemed clear to me that Joel was intentionally choosing the most expensive
instance of each item (chair, monitor, desk, etc.) that a developer could
reasonably want, not to suggest that every developer _needs_ his specified
setup, but rather so that he could put an absolute upper bound on what it
could possibly cost you to keep a programmer happy. It was a mathematical
exercise, not a recommendation.

