Working for an American multinational company with technical writing colleagues on both coasts of the US and me in Belgium, you’d think I’d be watching the clock to see when they’re in the office so that we can talk.

Nope.

I’m not watching the Instant Messager screen on my computer to see who’s available in the US. It’s my colleagues across Europe that I’m tracking. I often need them at short notice for information.
So which time zone matters the most to me when trying to get hold of my European colleagues during the day?

Lunchtime!

Between time zone differences and cultural differences on when to eat that exist between European countries sometimes I sometimes feel that I’ve been thinking about lunch for much of the day. If it’s X time, then A must be at lunch. And at X+1 time, B and C will be at lunch. C is at lunch at X+2 time …

From 11:00 in the morning (my time) my Finish colleagues aren’t around. It’s noon for them and they’re at lunch so no point chasing Finns then. An hour later, it’s my lunch time. So the German, French, Dutch and Italian colleagues know they won’t have me pinging them as we’re all at lunch.

By 14:00, my time, there’s no point contacting colleagues in Britain for information as it’s 1pm for them and they’re gone to lunch (except they’re not gone for long). In the past my Spanish colleagues would be off to lunch at 14:00 and often not return until near 16:00. So for a few years I was tracking a lunch time zone that could last up to five hours yet I never left Europe.

For many of us in Europe lunch is a main meal and not a grab-n-gobble sandwich at our desks. Sadly the two-hour lunch no longer (officially) exists in our European offices. When I moved to France from Britain years ago, I quickly adapted to a slow two-hour lunch with colleagues. The company canteen served a five-course meal with wine or beer. I then moved to Belgium to work for another company and lunch became an hour. Only one hour!

Working in a corporate environment can mean that local habits change. I can’t remember when the two-hour lunch disappeared in our French office but when we were bought by our current owner, they insisted that the Spanish office fall into line with the rest of the offices in Europe. They had to eat earlier and come back in an hour. They weren’t happy about that. These days I can ping Spain at 14:00 and get a reply.

My lunch time zone now at work is only around three hours.

Bon appetite! (Now if you could just get that info back to me by…and pass the salt. Thanks)

I’ve been reading up recently on agile environments. I don’t work in such an environment but have been struck at how often they discuss the importance of the office layout to encourage collaboration in a team. The preferred layout always cited is the open plan office.

The layout of the workplace does impact productivity. An open layout encourages communication between people. It’s a more dynamic place to work as it allows team members to interact more easily. The downside is it can be distracting if you need to concentrate. Cubicles encourage solo work, where less interaction is required. However, cubicles can discourage that cross-fertilisation of ideas and exchange of information that comes with close teamwork. Another disadvantage of cubicles is the potential risk, “Out of sight, out of mind”.

The culture of the workspace

There is also a cultural aspect to office layout to consider. Most Europeans work in open plan and most Americans work in cubicles. I’m not sure why this is. Which office layout you prefer may well depend on which you’re used to.

I’ve never worked in a cubicle. I’ve only worked in an individual office or in an open plan layout with up to six people. I’ve never worked in offices with large areas of open plan (+40 people).

Team benefits

In the agile environment you are located in your team. As my projects are determined by Product Management, I’m physically located with that team (I actually report to them). However, I don’t feel isolated from the other writers in the company, who are all located in other countries anyway. I’m in frequent contact with them by Instant Messenger and we chatter about tech comm. related topics and what work is like at our respective sites.

I’m an open plan person. I savour the opportunities to have ad hoc conversations with people, eavesdrop on the telephone conversations of the product managers around me and exchange ideas. I hear about customer evaluations as well as learn about the wider picture of product development and on doing business with suppliers (whose manuals I will be rewriting and with whom I will also be contact). I believe that this helps me collect a wide range of information to better focus the manuals I write and localise. I don’t want to work in a cubicle as I would find it isolating.

In my opinion, an open plan layout of, say, up to eight people is great for encouraging team collaboration. A larger team would probably need a careful review of the different types of workspaces that should be provided to balance team needs and solo work moments (for example a mix of individual desks, meeting desks, places for quiet work, hot desking…).

Coping with noise

Open plan can sometimes be distracting. There are four of us in the office and between us we have six mobile phones and four landline phones. We’ve reached a “gentleman’s agreement” not to use loud “amusing” dial tones on our mobile phones and to use the headsets provided for teleconferences (unless others are invited to listen in). If I really do need silence to concentrate when working on a project, I stay home that day and work from there.

Which layout do you prefer to help you do your work: Open plan or cubicle? What different types of office layout have you work in and which have helped you feel part of a team?