I’m no Feng Shui expert, but…

I’m a firm believer that the environment you work in has a huge impact on both how well you do what you’re doing and how you feel during the day. I think it shapes your state of mind and your stress level in ways that we in this high-tension society don’t really think much about; personally, I find that the more I have to occupy my mind with a single set of tasks for multiple hours at a time, the more important the space I do it in becomes. Bad lighting, dull cubicle walls, and, in my current case, a messy desk all seem to ratchet up my annoyance quotient in unseen (but increasingly predictable) ways.

I spent the late afternoon reading articles on language aptitude and fossilization in a quiet courtyard at UCLA today, surrounded by trees and flowers and the smell of eucalyptus. This is the same kind of reading I’ve been trying to get through at home (and in nearby coffeeshops) for days with mixed success, yet in a pleasant environment with a cool breeze and enough space to read in peace, it was really quite fulfilling. (It may also be that the selection of articles I brought with me were particularly appealing to me, but still – I was a lot more motivated to stick with my train of thought.) Which got me thinking about how what I get done seems to depend heavily on where I do it.

I know that Robert Probst, the person to whom invention of the dreaded cubicle is usually attributed, never intended for cubicles to turn office space into the anonymous cube farms that many office and tech workers suffer in today (apparently referring to their current use as “monolithic insanity“); indeed, I’ve seen them used in many environments fairly appropriately. Back at Purdue, when I had one of the CERIAS offices in the Recitation building, cubicle walls were used as dividers – but really only to the extent that they provided a little privacy. Three grad students to one faculty-sized office, as much desk space as I had working in industry, and the light from the window was still visible to everyone. I don’t know how other students felt about it, but I thought it was tastefully done. Communication was easy and comfortable, yet I don’t ever recall having this unpleasant feeling that someone was going to sneak up behind me. It was a good place to get work done, and a good place to collaborate.

The cube farms of the industrial workplace, however, felt a bit like working in someone’s very large, partitioned basement (even on the second floor). Cube farms are often located in old manufacturing or warehouse buildings, and if those buildings are well-lit, open, and airy, I guess they can be OK. The anonymity factor can be unpleasant, though. It’s hard not to feel like just another drone. If those buildings are dark and poorly lit with plain beige walls, grey cubes, and that cheap dark carpeting of indeterminate color, however, it gets to you over time. I think back on some of my past jobs and the distasteful sense of sickly yellow fluorescent light and dank grey fabric comes to mind, rather than any sense of what I accomplished there. Every time I’ve left a job in a place like that, I’ve always spent some weeks in wonder afterwards at how lovely the light of day outside is, and the realization that I really, really missed it.

One small step up from working in cubes is our current apartment. It is, at least, home, where I own my own time, and no one is going to sneak up on me while working (apologies to my former boss – he knows I tease about this, even though I’m serious about not liking to be surprised when I’m deep in thought). Still, even when it’s organized, it’s hard to work here. It’s a dark apartment, our walls are all this strange drab olive color, and all of our furnishings are temporary (we don’t have a couch – we have bean bags from Target) and not designed to be nice to look at. And it gets to me. I find it really hard to get past the initial inertia present in starting something intellectually taxing if I’m somewhere uncomfortable. (Also, having both of us work in the same room is tough, but that is just an aside – I am intensely protective of my own space, and have always, my whole life, needed a place for alone time. That’s hard in a one-bedroom apartment in Los Angeles, but who can afford more space in Los Angeles?)

And so I go out to coffeehouses and work alone, in the presence of 30 other people (and, even with headphones on, get to hear the life stories of all of the wannabe screenwriters in the room yakking to other patrons or victims on the other end of their ubiquitous cell phones). This, clearly, is not much of an answer. It’s just a change of scenery, and if the place is pleasant, it works for a time. If, however, you are surrounded by self-absorbed artistes and mentally-ill homeless folks chattering with invisible friends, it doesn’t work well. In Lafayette, I could sit and work for an afternoon. Here, I last for about 2 hours before I get annoyed. And feel like I’ve wasted so much time.

I wonder if there really is an appreciable impact on the bottom line when you have employees that just aren’t inspired to think and create in their environment (and someone has probably done a study – I just haven’t looked). I know that there’s been mention in the news of late about design competitions for making partitioned office space more liveable for employees, but seriously – how many people are there out there like me who either really require a private workspace with a door or else someplace aesthetically pleasing enough to make the lack of a private workspace less detrimental?

But no matter. I shouldn’t complain, really – there is a pot of gold at the end of this little rainbow, and it is this – our new home in Denver is aesthetically pleasing, light enough, and best of all, my lovely husband has graciously agreed that I can have the downstairs office to myself, which has a door and everything. Finally, space of my own that I can appropriate as I please.

Productive bliss, I hope.