Url changed from https://www.inc.com/geoffrey-james/apple-employees-hate-appl..., which points to this.

Submitters: when an article links to another one which is clearly its source, could you please submit that other URL instead? This is in the site guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html.

This is from August 2017, only a little after the new HQ was opened (in April). Maybe (2017) should be added to the title?

Also, previous discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14962663

Good catch! Thanks.

There is an excellent book called Peopleware by Tom DeMarco. Management should read it.

Open offices are fine if you have noise cancelling headphones...thereby eliminating the point of the open office.

No, open offices are never fine. I wear glasses, noise cancelling options are limited to on ear or in ear, neither are good for long periods of time.

Not to mention many women have brought up discomfort issues related to being visible at all times—which sounds 10,000% justified.

> Not to mention many women have brought up discomfort issues related to being visible at all times—which sounds 10,000% justified.

This is an entirely new negative aspect of open plan offices to me. As a man I never thought about this, but I could see how it could be uncomfortable for women.

Seems to go against the stated goals of achieving a more balanced workforce

Wow, new to me too. I had never thought of that.

Oh Christ, it could be awful. Luckily, and as an unremarkable looking male, I'm still clinging to a cube, and the noise there is bad enough.

I'll be contrary and say that I can't see how that's any way justified.

My employment contract didn't include any provision for being non-visible during working hours.

How is a workforce supposed to be cohesive and collaborative if half of it doesn't know when it's allowed to look at the other half?

Perhaps in the future both men and women will wear burqas to the office. But then we'll all have to agree one one 'non-intimidating' colour.

Maybe fine for some. Visual noise destroys concentration in others like me.

This is my affliction. Seeing a coworker get up to grab a coffee, use the restroom, etc. destroys my concentration. Noise is bad enough--and it's highly distracting on its own--but the visual aspect is far, far worse for me as there's nothing I can do.

I'm roughly 20x as productive when I work from home.

This is a big problem for me as well.

What kind of insane thinking is it to build an office where you need noise cancelling headphones to actually work? Why not just work in a sports bar during super bowl?

This would actually be way better for me because I wouldn't give a shit about any of the conversations I might overhear, if I could actually make any of them out.

Not to mention being uncomfortable if worn constantly, and the distraction of whatever you play.

Microsoft has been ripping out offices and replacing them with open floorplans - in many cases not even team rooms (which aren't so bad), but full out Facebook-style misery pits. From people I've talked to, guidance given to the teams that had to move into them included gems such as "avoid talking in the working space - if you need to have a conversation that could be distracting, please find a meeting room".

...and you have no problem wearing noise cancelling headphones all day (I can't)