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Apple is About To Do Something Their Programmers Definitely Don't Want (medium.com)
Last week, The Wall Street Journal had a big feature on Apple Campus, the big new beautiful office the company has spent north of $5 billion on. The profile, in which the reporter interviewed Apple's design chief Jony Ive, also mentioned about an open space where all the programmers would sit and work. Ever since the profile came out, several people have expressed their concerns about the work environment for the developers. American entrepreneur and technologist Anil Dash writes: [...] There have been countless academic studies confirming the same result: Workers in open plan offices are frustrated, distracted and generally unhappy. That's not to say there's no place for open plan in an offices -- there can be great opportunities to collaborate and connect. For teams like marketing or communications or sales, sharing a space might make a lot of sense. But for tasks that require being in a state of flow? The science is settled. The answer is clear. The door is closed on the subject. Or, well, it would be. If workers had a door to close. Now, when it comes to jobs or roles that need to be in a state of flow, programming may be the single best example of a task that benefits from not being interrupted. And Apple has some of the best coders in the world, so it's just common sense that they should be given a great environment. That's why it was particularly jarring to see this side note in the WSJ's glowing article about Apple's new headquarters: "Coders and programmers are concerned their work surroundings will be too noisy and distracting." Usually, companies justify putting programmers into an open office plan for budget reasons. It does cost more to make enough room for every coder to have an office with a door that closes. But given that Apple's already invested $5 billion into this new campus, complete with iPhone-influenced custom-built toilets for the space, it's hard to believe this decision was about penny-pinching. The other possible argument for skipping private offices would be if a company didn't know that's what its workers would prefer.
*pple has long been taken over by managers, marketers and fashion designers. The actual engineers are an afterthought.
the preceding comment is my own and in no way reflects the opinion of the Joint Chiefs of Staff
It's been a long time since Apple was (primarily) about technology. Apple is about fashion. Form over function. Appearance. Show. Illusion.
Apple has great technology. But unlike in the 80's and 90's, technology comes second (or lower) at the Apple of today. I remember when Apple was a great company. When BYTE magazine wrote that the history of the microcomputer industry was an effort to keep up with Apple, it was true, back when Apple was a truly great company.
Open plan space for developers to work? No surprise. Quite a difference from the day when Apple would do whatever it took to make developers productive.
I'll see your senator, and I'll raise you two judges.
I don't know why companies like Apple hamstring their developers with these open office design abominations. Study after study shows that developers are most productive when they have an office with a door they can close. The pointy headed bosses argument that they can wear headphones or take their laptop and move to a conference room doesn't work in reality.
For the salary they pay software engineers, it would seem that companies would not still be practicing outdated, brain-dead policies that are costing their company millions. Or in Apple's case billions.
just my 2 cent worth.
I'll refrain from the obvious jokes about the workers' pods only having rounded corners...
I really think the companies that get this trend right and actually want to keep employees happy will eventually settle on a mix of public and private spaces. Those of us who are older and like our private spaces have to remember that this is the age where "social media manager" is a real, full-time, highly compensated position. There are some people who thrive on collaborative spaces, constant noise and distraction, and love to work at cafeteria tables with zero personal space. There are also some (me included) who can't get any serious work done unless I'm in a private location with the door shut and "do not disturb" turned on in my various messaging accounts.
Unfortunately, the more extroverted among us tend to have the ear of HR more than heads-down workers like me. In addition, most corporate HR departments just copy what Google is doing verbatim regardless of fit. Google's where all the kids work, and companies love to have as many young exploitable employees as possible, so it makes sense...sort of. Unitl it meets an organization with a high average age of employee, that lives and dies by conference calls and work that requires concentration.
Let's consider the opposite strategy, then, if programmer is the 'single best example' of needing flow.
Should Apple sacrifice, I dunno, half the open area to work-pods you slide into like a fighter pilot? Basically a ring of three 4K monitors wrapped around you, the backs of the monitors 6" from the walls? I'm thinking four feet by six or seven. No windows, obviously. Sound insulation.
Is there no minimum to the amount of "distraction", that is, anything but what's on your monitors - that should be removed for optimum results?
If so, you've got the only argument they'll listen to - that you will take up even less of that precious office space. Open plans were never about anything but reducing that square-feet per person number.
That, and one other thing: 10x10 private offices were often places where people had some privacy in which to goof off. Watch YouTube in an open plan, and people notice. This is just not a real issue in a well-run place where the supervisor knows what the hell all her subordinates are doing and has done the work herself so that she has an idea how far along everybody should move every day. But when the super is too dumb to measure outputs, they will measure inputs.
When one of our corporate offices moved to a new location and got a ground-up remodeling as part of the deal, there were great opportunities to make a more functional space for everyone. Instead, the top level management for that location took charge of everything, designing a floor-plan the way THEY envisioned it. The "rank and file" employees barely got a chance to see it before it was approved and work begun on it.
The group of us in I.T. got a sneak peak at it, just before work started on it, and we collectively said, "Woah! Hold up! BAD ideas here!" The whole space was an open floor plan, except for a row of 6 "phone rooms" where you could shut the door to talk on a phone, placed on a small table, with a few chairs around it. That, and one short hall of offices with doors.
To be fair, it is a marketing oriented company, BUT a lot of the people working in this space are designers, or at least have jobs that require a lot of conference calls, video-conferences, and negotiating with clients over the phone. In other words, lots of need for quiet in the surrounding space so you can sound professional while communicating with people.
Our opinions held no weight though, and everything proceeded despite our complaints. So now? The office tends to be largely empty, because everyone decided they can get work done more effectively by just working from home whenever possible. The upper management folks who pushed for it? Well, they're rarely in the office anyway because they're constantly traveling. I guess they think it's fine when they finally come back for a few days though, since it's so quiet with so few people wanting to come in now?
But given that Apple's already invested $5 billion into this new campus, complete with iPhone-influenced custom-built toilets for the space, it's hard to believe this decision was about penny-pinching. The other possible argument for skipping private offices would be if a company didn't know that's what its workers would prefer.
Or the 3rd choice: They don't really care what their employees prefer.
Actually, it's a fourth: They believe that open plan offices promote creative interaction while closed offices promote focused productivity, and they choose to favor the former over the latter. There's also an element of flexibility. The theory is that it's easier for people in open-plan offices to use noise-cancelling headphones to focus when they need to be productive than it is for employees to walk out of their office and into a colleague's office when they need to collaborate.
I'm not saying that money never enters into it. But clearly for the likes of tech companies sitting on enormous cash reserves, money isn't the primary consideration. Competitiveness is. Staying ahead of the rapidly-changing technology world is. And they believe that open plan office spaces, with lots of additional space for ad-hoc collaboration in meeting rooms, lounge areas, volleyball courts, etc., is the best way to do that.
I'm not willing to say that they're unequivocally right, but they're certainly not completely wrong, either.
Note to ACs: I usually delete AC replies without reading them. If you want to talk to me, log in.
I work in an open office in Atlanta. It's so damn loud that some days I just send my developers home to work.
I bought some $300+ Bose QuietComfort 35 headphones to cancel the noise -- they help, but it's not enough.
I can use the foam earplugs you use for working around heavy machinery, but honestly, at that point how much degradation of productivity have you taken on when that's your own recourse?
I truly don't understand the open floorpan. It's only result is unhappy employees.
- Vincit qui patitur.
Actually, it's a fourth: They believe that open plan offices promote creative interaction while closed offices promote focused productivity, and they choose to favor the former over the latter. There's also an element of flexibility. The theory is that it's easier for people in open-plan offices to use noise-cancelling headphones to focus when they need to be productive than it is for employees to walk out of their office and into a colleague's office when they need to collaborate.
Whereas it is undeniably true that an open office results in more dialogue, I don't think that is the only way to encourage it. Nothing beats face-to-face and easy access to encourage collaboration, but the problem is, not many people are going to want to work like that.
I know I quit a job primarily for the reason of switching to open-office. (I had other issues with the place, but the moment they switched to open-office I updated my resume and started job hunting)
Open office is simply a much less pleasant environment in which to work.
"That's the way to do it" - Punch
Or the 3rd choice: They don't really care what their employees prefer.
Definitely this.
One of my primary red flags for bailing out of a place (or avoiding working there in the first place) is when they start opening up/making less private work areas, accompanied by some huggy-feely BS about why it's a good idea.
It's a sure sign that management either doesn't know or doesn't care what people want/need - either way, time to think about leaving.
The theory is that it's easier for people in open-plan offices to use noise-cancelling headphones to focus when they need to be productive than it is for employees to walk out of their office and into a colleague's office when they need to collaborate.
As if the need to collaborate with colleagues is something new. The part about "they believe that open plan office spaces, with lots of additional space for ad-hoc collaboration in meeting rooms, lounge areas, volleyball courts, etc." sort of contradicts the claim that open-plan offices reduce the need to walk away from your desk to collaborate. Does anyone in an open-plan setting really collaborate by yelling to a colleague on the other side of the room (who can't hear you anyway, 'cause he's got his noise-cancelling headphones on to avoid being distracted)? Or do you send an IM saying, "Hey man, take of your headphones; I need to yell at you"?
The number of times that another employee has distracted me in that entire time is zero.
Lucky you, but I've been in places where people were tossing beanbags and nerf balls around, and it gets old, really fast.
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
The theory is that it's easier for people in open-plan offices to use noise-cancelling headphones to focus when they need to be productive than it is for employees to walk out of their office and into a colleague's office when they need to collaborate.
Noise-cancelling headphones won't help with the visual distraction of people moving in your field of vision. Unfortunately I'm speaking from experience, at least I can't help registering extra movement in my field of vision even if I'm trying to concentrate on what's going on my displays. Sure, there are some occasions where I've picked up a valuable piece of information from conversations going on around me in an open office, but most of the time they are just an annoying distraction. As far as I'm concerned, open-plan office isn't the right place for developers.
I'm stuck in an open plan office, and there's plenty of dialog all right. Almost none of it about actual *work*. We have lots of Sales/Marketing/Communications types right next to the small developer group. And boy, do they talk. And talk. Loudly. And about every aspect of their personal lives that we really don't care about. The managers of those group work in a different state, and couldn't care less.
Noise cancelling headphones work great on repetitive sounds, like engine noise on a bus. But human voices (especially some of these people) cut right through. Most of the development colab happens on email/im/etc anyways, so we're almost always more productive working from home.