Comment by spacehome
6 years ago
To be clear, I'd be fine with a shared office situation with up to 3~4 office mates. But the open offices as discussed here are abominations. Maybe it does seem anti-social of me? I guess I didn't consider that aspect of it.
It just seems duplicitous of the two companies that I've been at to verbally say one thing when I still haven't committed and am trying to decide and then do something else 6 months later ... like a bait-and-switch.
I am not at all saying that it's anti-social of you to think that way. I agree with you 100%. But what matters here is this: The people who make the hiring decision are likely to be the same people who decided to have an open office, or, at least, are closer to the people who made that decision than they are to you.
Now there are two possibilities. (a) Either they themselves are actually believers in the open plan office kumbaya social happy togetherness crap, in which case they will think you antisocial for not wanting to be part of that. (b) Or, they are fully aware that the company just wanted to save some money on not having walls and the kumbaya social happy togetherness is just the way that they are whitewashing that decision to make it seem desireable to still work there. In that latter case: You not drinking the kool aid will be a red flag to them, making them have doubts about whether they will be able to adequately keep you under control or whether you will turn out to be an unstable element with a mind of its own. They don't need to resolve those doubts. They just need to have them, in order to make them not want to hire you. -- In either case, it's a dangerous game for you to play.
In either one of those cases, it sounds like a company I don't want to work for anyways. Bullet dodged.
I would only really care about jeopardizing the offer if it's a company that wouldn't have an open office plan, anyways.
In any case: The right way to negotiate for an office is not when you're initially hired, but when you've been there a while, have somehow come into possession of a fair amount of bargaining power against them, and are renegotiating your deal.
You really think so? That doesn't match my experience. I have always felt the most bargaining power before accepting the position, where the company feels they have to sell themselves. In both companies I mentioned, they were quite happy to show me my (respectively private and shared) offices when I was considering joining. I just want to lock them into that attitude. After I've been there a while, there's a real personal cost to leaving, which hurts my bargaining position, and they know it.
The same as if I really cared about any other accommodation (like a salary). I wouldn't trust my salary to a handshake deal.
Edit: I'm not at either of those jobs anymore, but I think if I had tried to negotiate for a shared office after the company had moved to an open office plan, I would have been laughed out of the room.