the “new” ACM office
As a result of several factors, ACM officers recently decided that something needed to be done about the office. If you look at previous pictures, you can see that indeed it was a huge mess. Effectively, the changes aim to make the front office more of a “professional” environment (ACM is a professional organization…? oops) and discourage vehement arguments and excess noise that scare newcomers off.
Wednesday we came up with a plan for moving furniture, etc. and Saturday afternoon we put those changes into effect. Changes to the office:
-the front room now has more computers, a different table arrangement, and soon will have more whiteboards
-the middle room has… well, way less crap in it, in addition to being the new home of the couches and the pinball machine
-the two vending machines are now adjacent
-the 5,000,000 rolling chairs now reside in the middle room
-mailboxes are next to the front desk
-more room to walk around both rooms
-food items now live in the middle room
Here’s a rough idea of what things look like now.
Front room, full of people at laptops (~10am Monday morning)
Okay, so we can’t say the front office is completely done yet…
Middle room, (empty, unsurprisingly). Arranged mysteriously like the front office used to be.
The two couches and pinball live here now:
Facing back towards the front office:
And once again, the front room, facing out:
So some thoughts on this change… I’m not convinced on it being 100% good or bad.
Pros:
-there actually is significantly less junk in the office. Both rooms feel roughly twice as big as they did before, and room to walk is kind of nice
-I got to vacuum in places that have never been and will never be vacuumed again, dusted bookcases, etc., so the office actually grosses me out less than it did before.
-there are marginally more tables in the front office now, which is good since most people just bring their laptops to work
-I really like whiteboards. I can’t wait for them to show up.
Cons:
-still not NEARLY enough open table space in the front room. If it was that crowded on a Monday morning… well what about when people are actually awake? Additionally, it’s not sufficient to have only enough table width to put two laptops back to back.
-who actually wants to move your conversation to the middle room? Talking in the front room is inevitable, but instead now we have created this idea that if you are loud you should move to the middle room. If anyone did that, the result would be that both rooms end up being loud, as opposed to only one of them. Plus, who wants a silent front office — that’s not inviting either. I walk by and decide whether to hang out there based on who is visibly in the office, and if things look fun I am more likely to go in. Suppose people actually *did* start socializing only in the middle room, I argue that it makes the office less inviting. If we let the talking and arguing stay in the front room, and were a little more conscientious about not scaring off new people, this wouldn’t be as much of a problem. Only a very small subset of members are actually OPPOSED to being nice (yes, this subset does exist). But maybe we just created an environment where people will go to the middle room, which will still be quiet, and work more comfortably. That’s fine, but I’m not sure it’s worth trading the comfort of the front room for.
-People seem not to know what to do with their legs. A lot of people apparently put their feet up on the couch or a chair or desk, etc. while computing, and you can’t do that if someone is trying to sit in the chair your feet are in. Unprofessional? Psh.
Anyway, it will be interesting to see if this change lasts, and how people adjust (or don’t). A photo progression of changes may be in order.
