Linked – Google got it wrong. The open-office trend is destroying the workplace.

I had occasion recently to interact with some folks who were very keen to tout their “open” office space, and how they were using it to attract recent college grads and encourage collaboration among coworkers. After some discussion about the space, they also pointed out how the organization was also flexible with letting folks work from home when there was a need.

On the particular day that I was talking to those folks, they admitted that the office was only half-populated, because of the number of folks taking advantage of that flexibility to stay home and get some work done.

As it turns out, if you want to get work done, particularly the kind of work that requires long periods of focused attention, you need to stay home to do that. The office environment, the place where we all go to work, wasn’t conducive to working. So in my own thoughts, it occurred to me that if you worked there, you would come to the office to have meetings, but stay home when you needed to focus on anything.

How does that make any sense?

If you work in an open environment, what has your experience been? Do you appreciate the collaborative space, or does your work require you to avoid it whenever possible?

Google got it wrong. The open-office trend is destroying the workplace.

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