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How To Get Rid of the Cubicle?

wikinerd writes "How can we get rid of the widely hated cubicle and its ugly cousin, the stressing open-plan office? Some business owners and managers cannot understand the advantages of teleworking, different office layouts, or the morale benefits of private offices with Aeron chairs. There are still people in high positions who seem to think that stuffing a bunch of engineers into a noisy landscaped office is the best way to organize a company. It is not, and we all know it, but can we prove it? How can we communicate to them the fact that living in a groundhog warren is bad not only for the engineers, but also for the organization?"

5 of 368 comments (clear)

  1. Simple solution by NineNine · · Score: 5, Funny

    How can we communicate to them the fact that living in a groundhog warren is bad not only for the engineers, but also for the organization?"

    I would speak to "them" with your voice (mouth, tongue, voal cords, et. al), either in person, or via telephone. Barring that, I would use a written format, such as "email" or "letter", in a lanugage that "them" would readily comprehend.

    Are there some other, hidden, secret forms of communication that I'm missing, here?

  2. One argument *for* cubicles by NerveGas · · Score: 5, Funny


        Years ago, our company had an office that was fairly low-rent, and didn't have cubicles. We just set up some desks around the edges of the office space, and some in the middle. One of the coders, in particular, had his desk facing the wall, and everyone in the room could see what was on him monitor.

        This same coder had his email client set to automatically open new messages. Yes, you can guess what it coming - one day, right after he left for lunch, he received some porn spam. Not just any porn spam, but some pretty far-out stuff, the kind that even most people who like porn wouldn't go for. The next person to walk past his desk was the VP of the company...

    --
    Oh, you're not stuck, you're just unable to let go of the onion rings.
  3. Private Offices and Open Plan Offices by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

    Private Offices Used for..

    1) Showing higher status
    2) Shagging the Intern/Teenage Junior
    3) Surfing on the internet without being spotted by other employees
    4) Playing music in
    5) Watching TV in
    6) Sleeping in

    Open Plan Offices

    1) being forced to do what you are paid to do as long as someone else is bothered to monitor your activity
    2) Daydreaming about Orgies involving all the teenage interns and juniors until interupted by supervisor for not looking like focused on work
    3) Chair Races when supervisor in toilet
    4) Smelling other people's farts
    5) Organising fag breaks
    6) Discussing last night's TV, night out or spousal problems.

  4. Re:Can't be done. by poopdeville · · Score: 5, Funny

    As a native Swedish speaker, I am disgusted by your post. The correct way to phrase this is "Bork bork snorf bogley coobical borken".

    --
    After all, I am strangely colored.
  5. Make yourself unreplacable..... by pakar · · Score: 5, Funny

    and.....

    1. Start talking really loud.
    2. Stop taking showers.
    3. Fart atleast once every 10 minutes.

    Good thing here is if you are located very close to your manager :)