The space planner was sniffing around this morning, getting ready (I suspect) to downsize my cube from a Double wide (8′ by 14′) to the New Standard Configuration (I rate an 8′ by 8′ although many will not be so lucky and will find themselves in either 6′ by 6′ or 6′ by 8′ boxes).

Throw in the fact that it features prominently in my blog’s name, and it seems somehow fitting that this article about the history of the cubicle should show up on CNN today.

Reviled by workers, demonized by designers, disowned by its very creator, it still claims the largest share of office furniture sales–$3 billion or so a year–and has outlived every “office of the future” meant to replace it. It is the Fidel Castro of office furniture.

…

That’s when Propst’s original vision began to fade. “They kept shrinking the Action Office until it became a cubicle,” says Schwartz, now 80. As Steelcase, Knoll, and Haworth brought their versions to market, they figured out that what businesses wanted wasn’t to give employees a holistic experience. The customers wanted a cheap way to pack workers in.

Propst’s workstations were designed to be flexible, but in practice they were seldom altered or moved at all. Lined up in identical rows, they became the dystopian world that three academics described as “bright satanic offices” in a 1998 book, Workplaces of the Future.

Designer Douglas Ball, for instance, remembers the first installation of cubicles he created for a Canadian company in 1972. “I thought I’d be excited, but I came out depressed,” says Ball, now 70. “It was Dilbertville. I’d failed to visualize what it would look like when there were so many of them.”

Right now, I sit toward the edge of a giant cubicle sea. I know exactly what it looks like when there are “so many of them.” We have to identify our location by pillar numbers.

Of course, once my cube gets downgraded, I may have to change the blog’s name to something more appropriate, like “Sucks like only a cubicle can” or something.

I’m also wondering where they think everyone is going to park. The lot is already full with the current population density. This building was originally built as a data center and was never supposed to be filled with people.

Actually, I’m often torn if the worst cube I ever had was the one that wasn’t really a cube, just a surface on the outside of a “real” cube at the end of a hallway or the one that was 8′x4′6″ so I could only get in and out by swiveling the chair to face the aisle. The seats may have sucked but the jobs were a lot of fun.

Well,

Imagine you’re in a open air office. One of those inventions of the dot-boom era where everyone, from CEO downwards must share the office space. Now imagine you’re sitting with you back to one of the main walkways. About 2 metres behind you is a fax machine. 2.5m behind and to the right is a photocopier. Some 3 metres away are the office printers. There’s a shredder there, too.

Feeling better about your cubicle yet? No?

Now imagine that only a month ago, you were sitting in an office with great views over the harbour and far out over the suburbia, all the way to the distant mountains. The office wasn’t huge, only about 4×3m, but big enough to concentrate on the work you have to do. Same company, two different work spaces.

I have to go now, someone moved my stapler. ;-)

At both my current and former employers, there are several cubes which have been built that have integral portions of the building infrastructure running through them (floor to ceiling). In one instance, it was a 4 inch diameter pipe supporting the ceiling. At my previous employer, the cube was allocated as a spare cube intended for visiting vendor representatives to work in when they were onsite.

At my current employers facility, they tend to be roughly 3×3 foot square columns (4 on my floor are in the cubical areas), and they’re generally allocated for printers/fax machines, interns and part time employees. A ’standard’ cube here is about 6×8, so losing 3 sq. ft. is a pretty big hit in terms of space. At least the manage to put them in a corner, though…

Gives a whole new meaning to the phrase ‘getting the shaft’ - which can be humorous when talking about a vendor, but not so much when it’s your permanently allocated workspace (not mine, thankfully)

At a company I worked for they downsized from 10×8 to 8×8… and some of us were immediately concerned about parking (as you are) so I wrote a humorous official-looking notice from the CEO regarding downsizing the parking spaces as well. People would have to get out of their sun- or moon-roof was on of the jokes. It got some laughs.
The post-downsizing lack of close parking space after 10am was no joking matter and was quite real, though.

as Bill clinton might say ‘I feel your pain’ ..

I’m afraid this is a bit of shameless self promotion, but considering the name of your blog you might be interested…

I don’t work in a cubicle, I work to make cubicles better. We launched our product (which is a sort of anti cubicle) at MacWorld SF 2005 and we are trying to get the word out that there are OTHER ways…

take a look and then if you like it tell your boss.