The Cubicle: It Only Takes Three Walls to Make a Man Feel Trapped

Since their appearance in the office environment, cubicles have been the brunt of jokes and the bane of existence for many employees forced to spend their days within “cube farms”. Although once hailed as a vast improvement to the work place, cubicles have come under recent attack for a possible cause in an overall decline in worker productivity. Studies suggest that the reduction in person-to-person contact can be detrimental to worker moral and production.

As technology advances within the twenty first century, so does the modern office. Today many large companies have abandoned the cube for “hoteling”. Hoteling refers to a work environment where desks are unclaimed, therefore allowing workers to move around with ease. Large, open rooms are full of tables with docking stations and lounge areas. Employees come in in the morning with their laptop and can sit wherever they’d like.

Hoteling not only helps reduce clutter (those involved are given a ‘locker’ of some sort in which to store items that would typically clutter their desktop); it also creates a larger sense of community. Think back to your college days. Those nights studying in the library, the days in the dining hall…the majority of your work was done within a communal environment. Productivity gives birth to productivity and with the elimination of cubicles employees can feed off of each others drive to work. The result is a better, more social work environment that encourages exertion and co-worker interaction.

To read more about the benefits of hoteling, click here.

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