
Ask HN: What makes the perfect office? I'm building one.  - gwynm
I run a web development agency with 18 people. The building we're looking at moving to will need extensive refurbishment, so we have a chance to spec out our office 'wish list' and then build that!<p>So: If you could completely design your office space (aesthetics, layout, furniture, lighting, flooring), how would you want it to be?<p>(We're a Rails agency, working in scrum teams of 2 or 4, doing some pairing but not full-time, based in London).
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albahk
Coming from a commercial real-estate consultant (as opposed to a
programmer/startup guru) these are the things many companies would do well to
consider when doing office fitout.

\- Don't put boardroom/meeting rooms against the windows with the best views,
leave them internal and put your employees where the best views/natural light
is;

\- Avoid a single monolithic meeting room and go for two smaller rooms with a
common wall that can be pulled back. Large meeting rooms for >30 ppl at once
tend to be under-utilised most of the time;

\- If the expected budget is more than US$100k consider bringing on a project
manager - they will generally earn back their fees with keeping everything in
budget and fixing potentially costly issues as they arise rather than 6 months
later;

\- Don't try to cut costs on anything that an employee touches, sits on or
uses i.e. chairs, desks, coffee machine etc. It is almost always a false
economy to cut costs here;

\- Ask the landlord to contribute some money to the fitout (can't hurt to
ask);

\- If you are going open-plan try to avoid offices around the perimeter
windows as they will tend to block the natural light from getting into the
main office;

\- Hardwood/concrete floors sound like a good idea but keep in mind they can
be quite noisy in high-traffic areas.

~~~
tomcam
Incredibly perceptive and amazingly employee-centric. I've learned a lot of
this the hard way.

~~~
albahk
Thanks for the comment - glad I can contribute something in my ultra niche of
knowledge and experience.

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struppi
I guess this is pretty different from person to person, but this would be my
ideal workplace:

    
    
        - Small offices (1-2 people) with doors that close
        - Long, streight desks (for pair programming), height-adjustable (standing desks)
        - Many small "meeting" areas for ad-hoc meetings
        - At least 2 large monitors per workstation
        - Walls, cupboards, ... covered in whiteboard foil
        - Lots of plants

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caw
I know this is sounds strange, but cubes can be nice from an operations
standpoint. It gives you access to other cube mates fairly easily, which is
essential in trying to keep stuff running.

While I would prefer a private or semi-private office, keep in mind there
comes a point where you're growing and there's not enough offices. You either
live with it for a while and you end up with new hires getting stuck in crazy
places, or you have to move offices which is a pain.

Given the choice between sitting in an entranceway of 3 private offices
(basically a larger room chopped into 3 private offices, with shared space in
between), or in a cube, I'd pick the cube. That same business then decided
that they needed cubes, so they destroyed 3 private offices, and stuck in
cubes. Since the room wasn't designed for that, the cube arrangement was
strange and not conducive to working together.

From experience, avoid whiteboard wallpaper. It gets trashy and it's hard to
replace because it's glued to the wall. You also don't have a tray for your
markers.

Height adjustable desks are amazing, having gone through an office upgrade
that included the installation of them. My old fixed desk wasn't exactly the
right height, so you have to make all sorts of other ergo adjustments.

~~~
EliRivers
"It gives you access to other cube mates fairly easily"

If those cube-mates have to spend a lot of time thinking about things, this
can be very bad news indeed. I see it all the time, and I think DeMarco poked
at it in Peopleware all those years ago. If it takes someone ten to fifteen
minutes to get into a mental flow situation, holding the context of their task
in their head and thinking about, a cube-mate leaning over to ask something
they could have looked up for themselves in a minute saves that cube-mate one
minute, and costs the interrupted thinker several minutes to get back into
flow. I even see it reach the point where people who know they really need to
think about something gather up their paper and disappear elsewhere in the
building.

~~~
caw
I agree with everything you said. People do disappear, WFH, and put up do not
disturb signs. However, this is from an operations standpoint, where heavy
collaboration is needed to get stuff done. It may not be good for a pure
programming shop.

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UnoriginalGuy
Spend every penny on the chairs. Get really nice chairs, like crazy nice, and
then get cheap desks (e.g. Ikea).

As far as lighting I would just say make it extra departmentalised. Some
people prefer to work in the shade others prefer those horrible office lights.
I would also look at air conditioning and how adjustable it is.

Nothing else matters because everything else will likely be changed as it is
needed. Even if you decide on a layout, if it doesn't work people will change
it down the road.

But seriously: Get nice chairs.

~~~
lefthansolo
nice chairs is a good one, but here are some others:

1\. some people don't like keyboard trays, but I've had shoulder problems
after several years of working without the keyboard at the right height. get
them

2\. get plastic adjustable stands for monitor and keyboards immediately, not
on user request. make it ergonomic, but you don't have to spend the big bucks

3\. some developers need special environments (i.e. less noise, less visual
distraction), but some feed off of interaction. learn what these needs are and
either make it happen or don't hire them, but don't find out too late. do not
handle this with white noise. it may mean they can't co-locate to be as
productive, and if that is a problem, you need to figure that out

4\. people sometimes need privacy. don't foster an environment that encourages
people to take calls inside or meet in cubes, distracting others

~~~
codeonfire
A point on 3. Some devs know what they are doing and prefer working alone in a
quiet area. A lot of other devs have no idea what they are doing and disparage
any situation where people aren't practically sharing seats and doing each
other's work. Why? because they want other people around them to answer their
questions, to do their work, and solve their problems. They are not "feeding"
off interaction. They simply don't know the job. Do surgeons only work in
groups because surgery is such as social experience that they feed off the
social energy which lets them really bro down and do some surgery? No.

The people who typically put offices together usually don't come from an
academic background and they typically don't do anything by themselves. Ever.
They go from meeting to meeting all day. They have no basis for understanding
that some jobs require individual effort. They buy group B's pitch by default.
So they make some really bad mistakes:

Open floor plan - great for people who need to ask a lot of questions. bad for
people who know the answers and will get interrupted.

Face to Face seating - great for people who want to get other people's
attention. bad for people who want to concentrate on hard problems.

~~~
lefthansolo
Good points, but I work with someone that is very able, very smart, but is an
extrovert. I've actually never worked with anyone that was an extrovert and
didn't do the work on their own, but I've heard of them. Usually if someone
doesn't know what they are doing, they don't want to let on about it. It just
becomes obvious.

What I don't understand is that when I go to small tech startups, the layout
is almost always like Facebook's: face-to-face in an open room. Sure it is
cheap, but I agree it is hard for some of us to think in those environments. I
think Microsoft's "everyone gets an office" is best from the introvertive,
thinking developer's point of view. Unfortunately, that isn't enough to make
them great. And cubes suck.

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eytanlevit
If you are from the US, I highly suggest you go and take a look a the way
WeWork has designed their offices.

Quite amazing, and people love it.

~~~
147
Found a tour of their offices.

<http://www.businessinsider.com/wework-labs-tour-2011-4?op=1>

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joonix
Fresh fruit stocked and a Blendtec/Vitamix for smoothies.

Herbal teas and teapots you can take to your desk.

Foam roller for the ailing back. Seriously.

Espresso machine.

I know this isn't layout but having these in your kitchen would be nice. I've
thought a lot about this in the past because one day I hope to be in your
position. Congrats on the new offices.

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mey
Since I haven't seen anyone else mention it, ventilation! Fresh, clean,
breathable air does wonders for mood. Good circulation also keeps people from
getting sick and heating/cooling issues from being silly.

This is not a simple thing to address, or easily noticed in spaces before a
wall is up.

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johnrgrace
Go call up steelcase, I've recently learned yea the make office furniture but
they spend a LOT of time and energy working on and thinking about how to set
up offices. Read their 360 magazine which talks about office space setup
you'll get some great ideas.

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asher_
I just watched the following video today:
<http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Cku6RJPIGG8>

It is about the Fog Creek offices, it's well worth the money if you are
designing an office.

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gadders
Joel Spolsky had some good advice:
<http://www.joelonsoftware.com/items/2008/12/29.html>

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brudgers
The task you are engaged in is called "architectural programming."

Along with a budget, it forms the design brief.

It is the sort of task that benefits from hiring a design professional.

