Open-plan offices are unproductive for hybrid/RTO call-heavy work
Reddit Community
Community Problem
Elevator Pitch
Hybrid work and RTO mandates are creating chaotic, noisy office environments where employees struggle to focus or conduct calls effectively, hindering productivity and collaboration.
Full Description
I’m still fully remote, but our company just rolled out an RTO policy with certain teams having to go back in. The poor project manager I work with messaged in chat and apologized because, in his words, “the office is getting crazy with everyone on meetings.” On his Teams video, you can clearly see he’s in this wide-open floor plan, surrounded by a bunch of people all trying to be on calls at the same time.
It literally sounds like a call center. How is this considered a productive setup? How is anyone supposed to focus or run a meeting without serious noise-cancelling gear and superhuman concentration?
From the Reddit thread(12 top comments)
- 826·Reddit commenter·1mo ago
so the big benefit of rto is commuting just to take the same meetings you had at home? cool system
permalink ↗ - 230·Reddit commenter·1mo ago
When my former company went RTO everyone had their calls on speaker. It was a loud revolt.
permalink ↗ - 229·Reddit commenter·1mo ago·reply
With the same folks none of whom are in the same location….
permalink ↗ - 193·Reddit commenter·1mo ago·reply
Yep, just teleworking from the office. What's fun is when the bosses are all cheerful about collaboration and socializing but then they reprimanded staff for talking.
permalink ↗ - 76·Reddit commenter·1mo ago
We have the exact same issue, you can barely have meetings now bc you can hear EVERYTHING in the bkrd when someone comes off mute, so, sitting there unmuted is a complete no go, and even when you unmute, half the time you ahve to repeat yourself. There's not enough conference rooms for all these calls/meetings, so people who can't scramble to reserve one, are kinda fucked. It's so dumb bc now we try to schedule our meetings on WFH days, COMPLETELY OPPOSITE of what the intention was. Edit: I should add, completely opposite of what the STATED intent was. The actual intent is something complete…
permalink ↗ - 60·Reddit commenter·1mo ago
This is the thing with executives mandating RTOs - we all know they haven't thought it through, but the reason they haven't thought it through is because they don't sit on the floor with everybody, they're all in their cushy readily provisioned offices. Have em sit on the floor with everyone. Let's see how they like the noise, if they even get chairs, docks, monitors / docks, etc.
permalink ↗ - 42·Reddit commenter·1mo ago·reply
The benefit is to get people to quit so they can reduce staff easier. They think AI will be doing everything pretty soon
permalink ↗ - 39·Reddit commenter·1mo ago·reply
And they will be ask to use headphones provided by the company and if the don't comply they get the boot?
permalink ↗ - 34·Reddit commenter·1mo ago·reply
At my last job, the VP got all excited about implementing an open office plan at our new headquarters. (Said VP has a private office with a door, of course.) I pushed back, and he went on this "straight from the marketing brochure" spiel about all the collaboration benefits we'd get. I looked him dead in the eye and said, "So if an open office has all these amazing benefits...why don't you want one?" Cue the surprised Pikachu face - and he never brought it up again.
permalink ↗ - 30·Reddit commenter·1mo ago
This is the same in my office. Random people who sit 3’ apart from one another in meetings all day yelling and complaining that nobody can hear them. I can’t hear anyone in my meetings because the guy behind me screams for hours straight. They can’t hear me when I try to talk. Nobody is on the same team, so the collaboration we keep hearing about isn’t a thing. It’s absolute chaos. My noise cancelling gear does not cancel this out despite me spending hundreds of my own money on it.
permalink ↗ - 26·Reddit commenter·1mo ago·reply
What if I told you instead of taking those meetings at your home office that had a desk and comfortable chair and dual monitors. You had to take those calls on your laptop in a phone box that got progressively hotter. Would that do anything to persuade you how great RTO is?
permalink ↗ - 22·Reddit commenter·1mo ago
One of the guys in our office, during a Teams meeting: I hate being in the office - you hear everything. Yep.
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