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Cubicle Etiquette?
zrgn asks: "Our team is moving to an open office type environment in a couple of weeks. The problem is that most of them have never worked in that type of setting before and thus may not know the do's and don'ts associated with a cube farm. I have two questions: what types of cubicle etiquette things have Slashdot readers come across that may help us in the new environment? (ie. don't listen to your voice mail on speaker phone); and What are some creative ways to relay 'cubicle rules' to the rest of the team?"
Second, in the interest of improving coordination and communication among all the people who you work nearby, make sure you hit the speaker phone button and turn the volume up, and don't forget to speak REALLY loud (remember those speaker phone microphones can't hear so well). This way everybody can hear your phone conversations since there are no pesky cube walls to block the sound. This will save you the time of having to explain the conversations that you just had will your coworkers that may be directly involved with what you do. Also, people who don't have anything to do with your job will get a chance to know how important and hard working you are.
Third, get some screen reading software. Use this all the time with the volume turned way up. This, like the previous advice will increase the likelihood of your coworkers getting valuable information from what you do, which they previously may not have been aware of.
Fourth, consider the savings of not having to call or email your co-workers! After all they are sitting just 40 feet away! There's no need to get up. Just yell out there names and have your conversation with them from your desk.
Fifth, you will be most comfortable and productive in this environment if you don't worry about hiding certain activities which where previously blocked from view. Go ahead and pick that annoying booger and whip it under the desk, feel free to scratch where it itches. We are all human anyway, and everybody was doing these things before, so to hell with it.
Sixth, buy a second monitor. Make it point the opposite direction of your monitor and mirror its content. Since your screen and the actives you are performing are already in the public view you might as well save the people the hassle of walking behind your monitor to peer over your shoulder. Note that this was not an option before the cube walls where taken down. And your nearby co-workers will appreciate the latest and greatest of your comments that you posted to slashdot. Note this step may not be necessary if followed the third piece of advice.
Hope this helps! Before I did all these things nobody ever noticed me in the office, and so I was often over looked. But now I'm the most talked about employee in my office!
Basicaly just don't do anything that's going to have an unwanted disruptive effect on your coworkers, That doesn't mean that you don't disturb them just make sure that you keep in mind that they can hear you.
That which is done from love exists beyond good and evil
1) the aforementioned listening to voicemail (or any call) on speakerphone. :)
2) Play your music on headphones
3) ditch the amusing new mail sound. Silence is golden.
4) Get your own lighting so everyone can leave the nasty overhead fluorescent lights off and light to their own specifications. better on the eyes, too.
5) To get someone's attention, arc a rubberband over the cubicle wall. Or hand-toss a nerf dart.
6) If you're the nervous twitch type, don't thump your pen on the desk incessantly, or whack your heel against the side of your chair, or whatever irritating thing you do.
7) If you have any brains, get some earplugs or a noise-cancellation headset.
8) Set the temp to a standard 72. Deal with it however you need to. "Space-heaters & deskfans for some, miniature American flags for others!"
9) Talk to the Claw! Don't stand around chatting with someone when it's obvious they're trying to get some work done. Be considerate - cube farms are hard enough to work in without a Chatty Cathy around.
10) PROFIT!
End of Line
I once worked in an office where a developer thought it would be a good idea to return a volley of Nurf darts stuffed with flaming toilet paper... Needless to say management was not to pleased with this decision! So I guess this should be slotted in the "do not do this" section of cube etiquette ;)
"1984" was ment to be a warning, not a guidebook. You hear that Kim Jong-il!? BushCo?!
Seriously. If you are not going to talk to somebody, dont stare at their work area without a reason.
People already feel without privacy without the looking.
If I had my druthers, no food would be allowed in the common cubicle area. If this isn't acceptable, please, no seafood, and no smelly foods, particularly early in the morning.
One coworker of mine would bring a bacon cheeseburger into the cubicle area for breakfast. Noone needs to smell beef and bacon that early in the morning.
If only common sense were more common, noone would need rules like this.
"Inattention makes clowns of us all" -Bean
There's nothing like Fish and Chips with lots of malt vinegar. I keep extra bottles in my desk. It's also good on plain potatoe chips.
Garlic has many health benefits and I recommend chewing it raw as often as possible.
Beans are also healthfull.
Also crackers with a healthy hunk of lindberger cheese is a great snack in the mid afternoon.
134340: I am not a number. I am a free planet!
My biggest gripe in a cube farm:
Eating.
If you want to eat in your cube, fine. Just keep it within your cube. I don't want to know about it. I don't want to smell your questionable fish-and-garlic-suprise, I don't want to have to wipe your barbeque sauce off my white board, and whatever it is you are eating I don't want to hear you chewing it (or doing what ever that guy in the fly did to consume his food).
And speaking of flies, take your trash to the lunch room as soon as you are done. The janitors will not dig through your pile of printouts to find your week-old pesto pieces, but there are six legged clean-up crews that will.
Thank you.
-- MarkusQ
Also, don't transact personal business on the telephone unless you REALLY want the whole office to know about it. That goes for making appointments, calling friends, the works. Sound carries well, and people tend to talk louder when they're on the phone with people they know well, because they're more comfortable.
Don't listen to music without headphones, don't pop popcorn and bring it to your cubby, and remember that anything you put on your wall may be seen by anyone at anytime.
that said, personalising your cubby can make you feel more comfortable. Even hanging colth on the walls is oke in some places, so get a good set of guidelines put out for what IS acceptable as well as what isn't. Offer, if possible, several types of whiteboards, corkboards, whatever, so that people feel that they can customise it at least a little.
"I'd say 'Have a good time,' but arson is still illegal.
I reside in the Engineering cubes. We like to pretend we're on the Enterprise by tapping our chest and shouting the name of whoever we wanna talk to. Couldn't do that when we had offices.
(Note: I'm not really being sarcastic here.)
"Derp de derp."
Just download some inappropriate audio file and leave it in thier messages. (Gotta love portable MP3 players aye?)
Make sure you use the boss's (or better yet your boss's boss's) phone after hours so the offender will think it's important.
Go here to create your own Slashdot dis
Make sure that you hoard those nice red staplers that will now be in plain view.
So much to do, so little bandwidth.
--
Try Mozilla
Here's a list of rules for behaving in a school computer lab; they should work equally well in a cubicle farm.
People tend to hire, and like to be hired by people who are like them. Thus most people will want the same thing. 3:00 nerf ball fight is expected for some, grounds for dissmissial in others. So customise all the rules you read for your enviorment.]
When you read all the funny posts that others have made, try to figgure out how violating that rule can be useful. In tech support you might want to turn up the speakerphone volumn when a really dumb caller is on for instance, so everyone can share the laugh. (or maybe not? what works for you)
Anyone who doesn't decorate their cube with pictures of the kids/spouse, and their "art" is not human and not someone you want to work with. I mention this because some companies try to enforce a no cube decerations policy. That said, keep it up to standards. (Even if everyone in the office is a nudist don't have nude pictures, customers may visit if nothing else)
Make sure their are whiteboards in every cube. I found that the whiteboard was the most useful thing in my cube, and so did most of the others I knew.
Get a laptop with 802.11. Take it into the bathroom with you and you'll have an office with a door!
Moving to an Open Office environment, eh? I'd start here! http://www.openoffice.org/FAQs/faq-questions.html Ohhh, open office.... :P
1. Find out who's the highest-ranking pillock to use his/her speakerphone to listen to voicemail.
... Profit!" to this list. Are you amazed at my originality?
2. Have a friend of an appropriate sex call him/her up and give him the following message:
"Darling! Last night was the most amazing experience of my life! Did you really mean it when you said you'd leave your wife/husband/etc and run away with me to Madagascar? I'll be round at [some time about half an hour after he/she usually listens to voicemail] with my suitcase and string bikini! See you soon snooky-wookums!"
3. Watch the results.
4. [Please note how I did not add "3.
: Bat :
I have discovered a truly remarkable
Make sure to place all your computer monitors as close together as possible (ie on the other side of the cube wall). That way when someone presses degauss it will degauss the whole office!
Terry Tate, Office Linebacker
Chris
Pet peeve of mine at my last job:
A coworker had this habit of brining in noisy toys, like the talking Sponge Bob Square Pants, dancing hamsters, etc. He'd routinely set them all off in succession several times a day. It didn't help that he himself had 2 voice levels, loud and bleeding eardrums. Nothing spoils your concentration like having to listen to a hamster sing "Kung Fu Fighting" followed by Sponge Bob's laugh, followed boing various "Boing!" "Crash!" etc sounds.
Others insisted on routinely using speakerphones for conference calls, even when several people in the same area were on the phone. Still others didn't understand the concept of "headphones".
There was also the guy who, when lobbing nerf darts and hitting someone, would scream out "OOOOHHHHHH!!!!" regularly. He'd also try to sing and play a guitar.
Now, if there were a normal office, it might possibly be semi-excusable (assuming you don't mind this stuff, or have a good set of earplugs--I recommend ones with the highest rating you can find, usually they're in the shooting supplies subsection of the sports equipment section of your local Mega-Lo-Mart), but this was a support center, where several people would routinely be on the phone with customers. The last thing THEY want to hear are all those sounds that drove me up a wall.
"The urge to save humanity is almost always a false front for the urge to rule." --H.L. Mencken
DONT leave your cell phones ON at your desk and leave your desk. You may like your ring tone but it will probably bother others.
DONT use a radio without headphones. Background noise is what it will come off as to others, no matter how low it is it will probably annoy others. Some people don't like it. ASK FIRST!
DONT humm or make lots of weird noises, it may annoy those arround you.
DONT use the hands free on your telephone, cause most people WONT want to hear your conversations. You should use a conference room for meetings even phone meetings.
DONT surf porno sites, other may be offended, also watch what you do surf, as others may be offended. Yes many places have no web surfing rules, but most places are pretty laxed about it.
Only 'flamers' flame!
Does slashdot hate my posts?
At least I have the satisfaction of knowing as soon as we figure out who is doing that, they're fired.
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* Think before you act. If it would annoy *you*, chances are
it may annoy the guy nextdoor, also.
* Keep the noise down. If you must have sound from your PC or
stereo, get headphones. If you need to carry on a conversation,
go to the person, rather than yelling across the room.
* Don't do anything you see done in a Dilbert cartoon.
* Shower or bathe at least once a week whether you need it or not.
There may be a handful of other things peculiar to the environment,
but I'm certain that you can get 95% of the way there with basic
everyday common sense.
Cut that out, or I will ship you to Norilsk in a box.
The #2 rule
Not just any headphones. You need the over-the-ear kind that actually seals over the ears. A lot of headphones produce almost as much second-hand noise as regular speakers.
Headphones that cover the ears provide some benefits:
- They keep the sound inside, reducing the noise that others might hear.
- They block out external noises, so you don't have to turn up the volume as much.
- This also reduces the noise that others might hear.
- It allows you to hear your music more clearly.
- It helps to prevent you from incurring hearing loss (not total loss, but partial loss; a serious and common result of using headphones)
If you intend to use them often, I recommend buying a high-quality pair. Don't consider anything under $40.JWZ may have some ideas
Just remember what they taught you back in elementary school:
Do unto others as you would have others do unto you.
Others have posted good lists of what to do and what not to do, but it all boils down to the same thing: if something would annoy you, then it will also annoy others, so don't do it. And remember that not everyone shares your tastes.
I work in a Japanese office; for those of you not familiar with Japanese offices, they basically consist of huge rooms (my office has about 90 people in it) with rows upon rows of desks, and if you're lucky a back wall to your desk. It takes getting used to, but if you can deal with having other people around while you work, it's not that big a deal. It may also serve as an impetus to reduce your Slashdot browsing time. (Or then again, maybe not...)
...I work in a cube farm and I use my Speakerphone for everything! I'm a programmer, and when people call its typically because they have found a bug, or something similar that needs to be addressed in the code. I NEED! both hands when trying to address such a phone call.
So...
1. Shutup and Deal!
2. Encourge companies to realize this and either use high wall cubes(The Walls are 7-8 feet instead of the standard 4 1/2 - 5)...or put programmers in offices...and managers in CUBES!
Power Corrupts,Absolute Power Corrupts Absolutely, leaving one person(group)in charge is absolutely corrupt.
I've been in a couple of environments where cube farms have worked well, and a couple where they've caused more problems than solved.
Since you're moving into a new environment, make sure that a couple of things are taken care of. These are more management-oriented, but they're things to think about.
For the general etiquette tips...
I worked at Frontier/Global Crossing, and it was the worst environment I've ever worked. Besides the fucktards who used the speaker phone to check voice mail, and the two women who used speaker phone to talk to each other when they sat 10 feet apart (which I've already mentioned), I also had the following. Note that instead of desks, we had these overgrown shelves that hung off the cube walls.
1. The guy opposite me used to drum on his desk, hard enough to make my monitor shake. When he wasn't drumming on the desk, he was stamping on the floor hard enough that I could feel the shaking through the floor.
2. The woman next to me had a poorly sheilded fan that she put right on the other side of my monitor which on hot days would turn my display into a bad drug trip.
3. She also had frequent visitors who would sit on her "desk", causing my entire desk and monitor to bounce up and down when they sat down or shifted weight. Just leaning forward or back would be an annoyance.
4. When "Little Drummer Boy" left, he was replaced by a guy who spent most of his work day on the phone talking to prospective buyers of his car, or talking to his former neighbours and coworkers back in New Jersey or arranging tee times.
Besides the poor working environment, the whole place was a massive cluster fuck of mismanagement, but that's a story for another time.
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