The architects often walk clients through it to show how an open environment works. There’s not a private office or cubicle anywhere, and there’s constant low-level hubbub: people in motion, and gathering into small groups. The tour makes some clients nervous; they wonder how their own workers would concentrate in such an environment. — NYT
Lawrence Cheek examines new trends in office designs which focus on providing employees room to roam and thus to think. Specifically, he looks at three examples the Seattle offices of Russell Investment, The Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation headquarters as well the offices of the architectural firm be hind the first two examples, NBBJ which occupies two 38,000-square-foot floors of a midrise office building it designed in 2006.
3 Comments
what am I looking at here exactly? a penalty box?
Nice (the penalty box)! This is a weird article because one of the examples is an absolute palace (the Gates Foundation) and the others seem a little miserable. This line is telling to me:
“You have spaces where you go and seek refuge,” says Eric LeVine, an NBBJ architect. “Or you hunker down at your desk, maybe you put your headphones on, and people will know to leave you alone.”
Headphones -- classy. This works for a few hours until your ears start hurting. And who is to say headphones aren't distracting? Music can be just as distracting as it can be invigorating/inspiring, IMHO. Furthermore, it's annoying to communicate in a team with people who are wearing headphones. I hope I never have to work in an office where headphones are seen as the main provider/enabler of private space.
I have worked in an open office for years, but it was small enough that there were many moments of productive silence, and poor enough that I didn't expect more.
yeah - open office space only works with small numbers of people (and even then you need private "phone-call space") - once you get over 10 or 20 or so it starts to feel oppressive. Architects tend to be the worst offenders - the way desks are arranged in larger "open" offices feels more like a sweatshop/factory with the senior people acting as draconian floor managers, computers essentially replacing looms or sewing machines...
so... whenever you interview someplace and it's a row of desks all facing the same direction...
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