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Engineering efficiency in open plan vs seperate offices

Andy Millar
Just for once I'm working in an open plan office *. I've been, from my point of view, very lucky (or rather, very determined!) - for the last two years I've worked from home, and for 15 years prior to that I have had a succession of private offices (in a company where the official policy was that only the president and VPs had private offices!)


HOW DOES ANYONE GET ANY WORK DONE IN AN OPEN PLAN OFFICE??? Sorry, that just burst out smiley


Now, thinking back to a LONG time ago when I was working in development teams of maybe 2-3-4-5 engineers it did actually seem to work well for us, we could share and bounce around ideas, however when I started managing the same team in a large office space it was clear that those discussions were also extremely disruptive to anyone else in the same office area **. The best arrangement I've worked in for team engineering was probably when we had 5 of us in a single (fairly soundproof) office.


Equally, having been involved in business management, I am very well aware that large open plan offices are cheap and flexible, but personally I'm suspicious of the impact on overall productivity, at least for engineering functions.


I haven't even started discussing getting the air conditioning set right for everybody...


Does anyone here have any views? It's a serious point.


Right, I will stick my headphones on, play some brown noise, and try again.


Cheers,


Andy


* Our company Mentoring scheme is being audited by the IET today, hence the fact I've been asked to work at HQ and prepare to be quizzed by the IET!

** I led a raiding party and commandeered a soundproof space away from anyone else where that team could work, before any actual murders occurred. I ignored the suggestions from the rest of the engineers that it should also be made airtight...
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    I'm not sure that I'm fully comfortable with the thought of working in a non-assigned desk environment.  A previous employer tried to implement something similar many years ago but it failed spectacularly! Employees would continue to bagsy 'their' desk and woe betide anyone who dared sit in it! (Bit like unassigned car parking spaces where some continue to park in the same spot day after day and get very upset if you park there instead... wink)  You also had little 'cliques' form with particular people sitting together and ostracising anyone new that sat close by.  Here's a link to some research that says hot-desking and activity based working environments aren't all they're cracked up to be


    Now where I can see this kind of arrangement working well is within a team of people who, for the main, work from home or are on the road most of the time. What is the value in having a permanent desk for them if they're not sitting at it for 80% of the time? 


    I'm also a great believer in the ability to personalise your desk space. We spend more time at work than we do at home with family (if you discount the amount of time we're asleep with only our dreams for company) so having an environment you're comfortable in and that makes you happy then the more productive you are! In my opinion anyways... 


    Here's a picture of my desk at the IET to illustrate wink

    fc23ebd57debee048078c7fe406d14c9-huge-desk.jpg

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    I'm not sure that I'm fully comfortable with the thought of working in a non-assigned desk environment.  A previous employer tried to implement something similar many years ago but it failed spectacularly! Employees would continue to bagsy 'their' desk and woe betide anyone who dared sit in it! (Bit like unassigned car parking spaces where some continue to park in the same spot day after day and get very upset if you park there instead... wink)  You also had little 'cliques' form with particular people sitting together and ostracising anyone new that sat close by.  Here's a link to some research that says hot-desking and activity based working environments aren't all they're cracked up to be


    Now where I can see this kind of arrangement working well is within a team of people who, for the main, work from home or are on the road most of the time. What is the value in having a permanent desk for them if they're not sitting at it for 80% of the time? 


    I'm also a great believer in the ability to personalise your desk space. We spend more time at work than we do at home with family (if you discount the amount of time we're asleep with only our dreams for company) so having an environment you're comfortable in and that makes you happy then the more productive you are! In my opinion anyways... 


    Here's a picture of my desk at the IET to illustrate wink

    fc23ebd57debee048078c7fe406d14c9-huge-desk.jpg

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