Struggling through the Crystal Maze in our hunt for a spare CAT5

half-full-glass possibility: I used to work with Dabsy

half-empty-glass possibility: all corporate workplaces are equally fucked-up

It's the second one, ain't it? The doomed Doomed DOOMED one?

I used to dream of office moves

In true Yorkshire style I really did relish the thought of an office move.

But then there was 3 of us in mission control that made the cleaners cupboard look spacy (then they stuck a second door onto a mezzanine floor so it became a corridor too) only benefit was it 8 network ports per desk.

Now I've got 2 network ports but an office with 2 of us the size of a semi-detached. (I still miss the second monitor)

In the company I worked for fifteen years ago we were moved about every six-eight months. It looks the developers were allowed to use only the office nobody else wanted, so as the company was growing - and it was growing hiring more sales/management people (always looking for the best offices), not developers (it went bankrupt a few years after I left), developers had always to move elsewhere. It was done during working hours, and nobody cared about delaying work and the associated technical issues.

In the five years I worked there, I was moved in 11 different offices (always working on the same projects with the same colleagues), sometimes to the same floor, sometimes to a different floor, sometimes to a different building, a couple of time to "temporary remote locations" nearby so we also had to move the dev lab server room because connectivity with the company server rooms was a joke, once they attempted one of the first wireless bridge, it should have delivered 2Mbps, but was very unreliable. Anyway, Visual SourceSafe was unusable at such shared bandwidth (and some DBs as well)... but it was a tough fight to be allowed to move dev servers on the local LAN as well.

One of the temporary site was a street shop, so people passing by could see us from the large street windows, but nobody ever tried to enter and buy a developer. Another one was an old factory building, it had been fully cabled with new shiny Ethernet port and switches, just the company was one of the old IBM resellers dinosaurs and all machines we moved there had Token Ring NICs...

The CEO secretary had chosen the furniture herself: soviet dark gray high metal walls divided the desktops, and casted a gloomy mood over the whole place. When we were (almost) allowed to remove them, it was like when the Berlin Wall came down. Each and every developer, with any tool they could find or improvise, started to demolish the damned thing with fiery happiness...

Someone actually noticed a switch was added? What gave it away, the sudden increase in productivity and decrease in complaining about network access?

I remember adding a wifi cable router to a network so a team I was in could actually do their jobs. Static IPs were required to let us through the firewall on a policy with less restrictions so we could connect to remote servers and do the work we were paid for. As the team expanded the 3 month + wait for IT to sort things out became a running joke. Another member of the team managed to get a spare high end desktop whitelisted so that became a LAN accessed team workstation as well.

If the software auditing the internal network ever raised a flag about an unknown device nobody ever acted on it. Every corporate I've worked in has had their internal network locked down so far I can't do the job they hire me for unless I use mobile internet or the buildings guest wifi. Unfortunately waiting for IT to sort it out would mean I'd have reached my contract end before I had access :(

Aquarium

One of my jobs involved that particular layout. It was funny, because the whole floor was remodeled from a "sushi bar" layout to the "aquarium" layout, supposedly to use them as conference rooms. But what really happened was that we were stuck into those conference rooms. The good thing is that we didn't have Ethernet port shortages, but we did need to raise a ticket so that the network dudes would enable 'em and put 'em on the correct VLAN. It was fun, as the conf room we were assigned to was small, so our 2 person team was very comfortable.

The joy of moves...

We had a manager who relished in moving and rearranging her "teams" every few months. The catch is, she didn't tell anyone below her... neither supervisors or worker bees. So on a late Friday after they've all gone home, myself (and maybe a contractor) start the IT work (pc's, ports, phones) and building services starts everything else. Chairs, sometimes cubes, and naturally, all the junk that worker bees bring in.. dolls, toys, posters, etc.

After a long weekend of this crap, we had to be in early, early Monday to direct people to their new desks otherwise, they wander around aimlessly looking for their new place. And we have to be ready to deal with the whines about things not working right or not in the exact location as things were on their old desk.

That manager is gone now.. but in the usual style, she was promoted and moved to a larger office. Now, instead of moving 100 people, she's moving 200-500 at a time....

Bell

Years ago, before they knocked it down, I used to work in Bell Telephone in Antwerp and the first we'd know of a move would be when a Jobsworth (he would be the one with the small greasy moustache) and a Workman (the fellow with a brown overall) would turn up at your desk.

Jobsworth would look at his clipboard in an officious manner and whisper something to the Workman who would clag a sticker on your desk corner marked something like "18/F/12" and walk off.

You knew that you were about to be moved.

There was no point in asking the Workman where you were going as he didn't know and the Jobsworth wouldn't tell you. "It's not possible", he would say in his Flenglish and move on and put another sticker on someone else's desk.

We may still be working for the same department but we could end up anywhere. And usually did.

And did our department manager know of this move? No. It was all down to some mysterious department somewhere else which decided these things and when we landed in the new place we'd either carry on as before or see if the manager of those around us wanted a new body on his team.

Little wonder that they knocked the place down.

Watching the funny monkeys

Working in a cleanroom I've come to dub the tour groups who watch us work from outside to be "watching the funny monkeys". Quite who are the monkeys and who is watching who is debatable. I remain convinced those idiots in the suit and tie got the short end of the deal. (Not to mention they don't always look that intelligent with their noses pressed into the window to try and get a better look)

Glass conference rooms...

They would be "really cool" of you had that switch controlled opacifier type glass. One flip of a switch and it all turns out dark.

Of course any BOFH worth his salt would have an auxiliary switch to turn the function in its opposite sense, at the most opportune time. I suppose that is another story.

But the magic glass is a bit pricy so I doubt that bean counters would approve and the general idea of glass conference rooms with the nice sound board qualities of the glass well known would be a terrible thing.

Thankfully at the last place I worked at, you just plugged in your computer and DHCP did the rest. The telephones were that way as well. Unfortunately the phones didn't allow for bluetooth headsets, but I solved that by going to ebay and getting a more improved model, and the bluetooth adapter. The phone/IT people never discovered I did it. When I left, I took my goodies with me, and left behind the "original" stuff. It was nice to have the computer sound AND the telephone in my ear so as to not annoy anyone.

I'm getting a kick out of this

My company of 150 or so is about to move into the city, to a newly rehabbed "innovation district", because the management thinks a new location will help us get noticed more.

Doubles my commute, huge disruption to our work, and we lose a free parking garage by moving to a location that's accessible only by public transit. Normally, this would be good, except that the public transit here is terminally dysfunctional.

The half of the workforce, mostly young and single, who live in the city think this is a great idea. The older half, more settled in the suburbs are less enthusiastic. Management is pushing full ahead, so already, daily work is being interrupted by moving tasks.

Fun times.

Ah! Alistair! You forgot the other critical tautology of impromptu office subdivision: when erecting glass fish-tanks inside open plan offices for any purpose (usually, a manager want's a nicer office) it is mandatory to ensure that the newly divided areas each contain EITHER the air-conditioning vent OR the air-conditioning controls and thermostat but NEVER both.

Glass Meeting room for Conferencing suites.

I always wonder what idiots decided glass meeting rooms with polished wood floors would ever create a good space to use audio & video conferencing products in. " You sound like you're calling from a toilet" my CEOs participant says.

Deploy some carpets & wall tapestries.

Take the analogue conference phone home & try it in your nicely furnished, carpeted lounge. Then call me and tell me the echo canceller is broken.