Ask Slashdot: What Makes a Good Work Environment For Developers and IT?

An anonymous reader writes: I've been unexpectedly placed in charge of our small technology department at work. We have three dedicated developers, two dedicated IT people, and one 'devops' guy who does some of both. It's the first team I've managed, and I'd like to do a good job of it, so I ask you: what makes a good work environment? I have my own likes and dislikes, of course, and I'm sure everyone can appreciate things like getting credit for their work and always having the break room fridge stocked. But I'd like to hear about the other things, big and small, that make it more fun (or at least less un-fun) to come into work every day. This can be anything — methods of personal communication, HR policies (for example, how can reviews be not-terrible?), amenities at the office, computer hardware/software, etc. I also wouldn't mind advice on how to represent my team when dealing with other departments.

Comments

Re:bah

[quantaman]

Bah.

I don't get people.

I don't want free drinks. Video games to play at work. A ping pong table. Any of that.

All of that, just EXTENDS the work day. You're not going to go in, play ping-pong for 4 hours, and then work 4 -- and get paid for 8. Instead, the expectation will be a longer work day.

In reality, all of these silly perks are just non-cash compensation for long work days.

You know what? Keep the free drinks, the catered lunch, the free this and that. Keep the ping-pong table, the toys.

JUST GIVE ME MONEY. Give me MORE money, and keep all of that!

Keep my hours SHORTER, so I can go out and PLAY WITH PEOPLE I WANT TO PLAY WITH. While people at work MAY be fun, when *I CHOOSE* who to play with, *I KNOW I WILL HAVE FUN*.

I really disagree with this. I'm going to spend about half my waking life at the office, I sure as hell want it to be an interesting place.

I don't know about other people but for me productivity is 90% motivation, if I whittled away half the day but worked with complete focus for the remaining half I would be a fantastically productive employee.

So for that I would say to keep things fun and focused, tasks should be small with well defined goals, even if you make some busy work it won't matter because the workers will be that much better. There's nothing worse than being given a giant task with no clear purpose or metric by which to try it. Include a couple paid coffee breaks. People can't work effectively for 4 hours straight, a couple glances at /. aren't the solution and developers sure as hell won't waste personal time recharging for a couple minutes at the office. Give them a pair of coffee breaks, encourage them get away from their desks, the increased productivity will more than make up for the lost time.

Make some sort of intermittent fun events at the office, food events or games of some kind, don't make it a corporate spirit thing, just a thing for people to have fun. It breaks up the monotony for the people who participate, if nothing else it makes the office a more engaging social environment and gives people an opportunity to interact.

It doesn't work for everyone, in general the older the employee the stronger their non-work commitments and the less they'll be interested if office socialization, but if you can make the office environment more engaging you'll improve productivity and quality of life for everyone involved.

A final thought might be to try pair programming. It hasn't really caught on because programmers tend to be fairly introverted and computers are very personal spaces. But the published studies suggest it can be very effective for both productivity and employee satisfaction, you improve knowledge sharing since its a lot easier to ask a question when you're already talking and you kill a lot of time wasting since it's a lot harder to zone out when interacting with someone.

Re:bah

[uncqual]

Amen. Pay me well. Give me an office with a door so I can concentrate on the details of whatever I'm going to foist on our customers (who, in the end, pay me). Provide up-to-date technology tools. Cut out bureaucracy.

Skip the ping-pong table and the pinball machine. If practical, have a credible onsite cafeteria as a timesaver, but no need to make it free.