To my coworkers:
We work in a cube farm. It is common courtesy when you work in such situations to observe the Cubicle Code of Ethics. Many of you have been violating the Code. Please take the following suggestions to heart:
1. Turn your cell phone off. If you can't bear to be cut off entirely, at least turn it to vibrate.
2. We all take personal calls now and then. So we all end up overhearing things that are not for general consumption but that cannot be contained by the cube. Pretend you didn't hear these things. Don't ask about things you overhear and don't spread gossip based on what you overhear.
3. Speaking of personal calls, lunchtime is a good time to go somewhere private, turn your cell phone on, and make your personal calls. I don't want to hear the lurid details of your private life.
4. Don't yell, "So-and-so? Are you there?" over the wall of your cube. Just get up and look. It's good to stretch every once in a while and the yelling is annoying.
These are simple matters. Please take them to heart.
Yours truly,
An annoyed coworker
Moi
- Snickollet
- I'm a mother and a widow, and a whole lot of other things. Here, though, I tend to write about parenting, grief, and their intersection.
Subscribe To
Posts
Comments
22 comments:
I'm moving from a building where I have an office with a window (!) to one where I will only have a cube. I am DREADING it.
My office is just as bad and we're not even in cubes (the walls are very thing). All afternoon, my co-worker has been making calls to the other parents of his son's hockey team. Very annoying to have listen to! Every now & then I get up and close his door and then he opens again! arrrgh!
I'm in one of those offices where we already know the color underwear each other are wearing (figuratively). Everyone of us break those rules but as far as I know, none of us care. We all have the same OB, we are all friends and we all work together... it's nice being one's self. It's a free and creative atmosphere...
However, in an office where that may not be the case, it would be horrible. I was working in another office for a while and I kept my phone on the "one beep" setting because I can never hear or feel the vibrate setting... it was a nice compromise (at least I thought it was)... My phone also only rings once a week if that so that makes a difference as well...
That's bad. My co-worker, a man in his late 50's sets up dates constantly during work. He spends half the day on various dating websites and then he speaks with his potential dates on the phone. I've heard his life story dozens of times.
The previous occupant used to yell at and threaten her kids nearly every day. Cubes suck.
try working with a boss lady that sits right next to you, yells on the phone like it's the natural thing to do and shouts out when asking for different people's extensions...like she can't look them up herself! I feel your pain.
Yeah, I know about cubes. I'm an admin. ass't. in the Econ. Dept. at a liberal arts college. I used to have a great, big, beautiful office -- but the school grew and the office went to one of the more "important" people, a new prof. Now I get to listen to ALL of them talk at me all day as they make their way past my "cube" to the coffee. I think I deserve more pay, as I'm now even more of a shrink for them than I used to be!
Preach it, sister! Well done!
One year the woman in the cube next to mine played the Chipmunks Christmas album all winter long.
Jenn wins.
Now print this up and leave it somewhere everyone can read it. :) Do NOT include your name of course.
Amy in BC
Oh man I used to work amongst a gaggle of girls who would shriek and giggle and make me feel like I was in high school ALL DAY. Sometimes they would ask if I was listening, and I would shove my headphones over my ears and pretend I hadn't hear them. Individually, they were nice people, but something about them all together... ack. Drove me nuts.
Cubes can bring out the weird in people.
My co-worker one cube over has the tact of a mack truck. It's very hard on one's shoulders to cringe all day long. Plus, she listens to all my conversations and pipes right on up if she thinks I'm not going the right direction with something - even if she's totally wrong about the subject. Really, the cube rule ought to just be "When it comes to your neighbors, pretend your cube has walls. When it comes to you, remember that they do not."
I am SO glad I don't work in Cubeland anymore!
We are in cube land. We have one bunch of people in sales who insist on having shouted conversations - they are 25 feet away from me and 4 feet away from each other. Now I yell, 'Be quiet' or call their names and say 'shush!', which embarrasees them no end.
Nothing is private and I am the most overlooked as I am on the end and due to computer cable restrictions have my back to the entrance.
I hate it too.
The noise is the thing that gets to me the most. I would be a lot more productive in an office.
At my last job I had a very small but actual office for two years. Then I got moved to a cube farm.
My entire work experience changed. It was as if I worked in a totally different job. The noise, the eavesdropping, the parade of smokers marching outdoors four times a day, the sticking your head in to comment on something I'm working on even though you don't know as much as you think you know. My production went down dramatically. I felt foggy all day.
Although I second, Jenn wins.
Rock on, sister. I have never had an office in my life, but it's my dream to one day have one -- in large part because of what you describe.
Now, I'm as happy as the next guy to do personal stuff at work... but I do it all over email. Ahh, well, it sure is good practice at getting along.
we dont even have the pretence of privacy. we have no WALLS or screens around our ... ahem ... cubes. just desks pressed up against each other. i know EVERYTHING about EVERYONE. seriously. there are no secrets
We have flex space at my office. You walk in, find an empty place and connect your laptop. You get no files, no personal possessions at all. It is so demoralizing at times.
At least you guys all have a cube of your own - which is something I never thought I'd be jealous of!
I hate cubes!
Oops. My new office is designed for the 'free interchange of ideas'. We each have our own desk areas, but with metal screens instead of walls. We are all guilty of just calling things out to each other, starting group conversations or whatever. The guy next to me listens to electronic music all day long (though the Chipmunks Christmas album still wins).
I had to angle my desk and screen so the nosy woman next to me couldn't crane her neck and whine out, "What are you working on now?"
Cube farms look like Meerkat holes, with little heads peaking out all day long...or wait maybe those horrid Whack-a-mole games with heads popping up randomly...I don't care much for cubes, don't have one now.
I agree, Jenn wins, AHHHAHHH Chipmunks Christmas is probably played nonstop in a special circle of hell I bet.
Post a Comment