How Cubicles, Telecommuting, Personal Computers, and Email Shifted the Way We Work

0:28This episode is brought to you by Google Chrome. deep breath of fresh air. Breezely is a collection of drapey pants, shorts, and tanks designed to mix and match with your wardrobe as the weather warms up. It's all made in our lightweight, stretchy, swift fabric. Throw on these everyday staples after practice and bring an airy feel to your daily moves. Shop the Breezely Collection now at lululemon.com.

0:53Offices, and the ways we use them, are constantly evolving. There is nothing natural or fixed about the spaces where we work. In fact, reporting to a building to do knowledge-based work is a relatively recent idea. When you look at the buildings in the city, you take for granted that work occurs in the office. Then you realize that work has occupied so many different spaces, so many different environments, that the office is just a short blink in the history of time. Architect and workplace design researcher Augustine Cheves says we need to remind ourselves that offices had to be invented. And over time, they have evolved to meet our own changing needs and expectations.

1:43Now that COVID-19 has upended office life worldwide, we thought understanding the ways the office has evolved could help us frame the changes happening today. With the help of historians, architects, and stories from HBR readers, we took a look at four key moments in the history of modern offices.

2:06In the 1960s, the Herman Miller Furniture Company introduced the Action Office. It was a flexible combination of desks, tables, and walls, offering workers flexibility and privacy. But the need for office space was growing quickly. Other furniture companies introduced copycat versions of the action office, and companies eventually started using them to simply jam more people into less space. The modern cubicle was born. Now, when I started with a cubicle, it looked nice when I walked in, but when I started working, it didn't help my productivity. Clemencia Villamil, who worked in HR in Venezuela, remembers transitioning from a big office to the isolation of cubicle land.

2:53It was difficult to make that link with people being in a cubicle and being separated from everybody. It made my job easier, probably, so I could concentrate with my interviews when they were phone interviews, but it didn't help my social skills. Another unintended consequence of cubicles. You know, I'm five feet tall. So for somebody who's five feet, a cubicle is really, really a bad idea. Because most cubicles must be about five something. So everybody could see over the cubicles and socialize. And there I am having to go around every single cubicle to see somebody else.

3:33The concept of telecommuting was first proposed during the oil crisis of the early 1970s as an alternative to gas guzzling commutes. By the 1980s and 90s, technology had made teleworking viable for more jobs. And many companies began experimenting with remote work programs to reduce office expenses and offer employees greater flexibility. I've really never worked in an office in my entire adult life. Rex Goodman was a remote sales rep for United Airlines in the 1980s. He plotted out his sales visits with little blue dots on roadmaps and hunted for payphones, checking in with the office receptionist for messages.

4:11Because there was no voicemail or anything at that point. And then return those calls to the clients that called you. But the first thing he had to do was find a payphone. Rex's life changed when cell phones came along. He got his first one in 1995, but it wasn't an immediate liberation. Kind of amusingly, we really weren't allowed to use them that much. Minutes were so expensive. it. In 1936, Alan Turing published a paper that proposed something called an automatic machine. If someone could encode a problem on paper tape, Turing's machine could solve it. And in the decades that followed, computers slowly made their way into offices.

4:52In the 1950s, companies could rent gigantic IBM data processing machines for about$15 ,000 a month. That's the equivalent of about 160 ,000 US dollars today. By the 1980s, computers were much more common in offices, but you needed specialized skills to use them. But you used to have to go to a computer room, you used to have to sort of program using tape or cards. So you would take your cards, load them in the card reader, load your program, execute your program, run it on a screen and keyboard in the computer room, take your printout back to your desk, and then trawl through the errors, and then three days later repeat it.

5:42Roy Illsley, who worked in IT in the 80s, also noticed that personal computers changed the way people worked together. When you go back before the personal computer was there, you didn't have a a desk with a computer, you had to go and talk to people. But as soon as you got the personal computer, your mobility slowed down. You stopped getting up, walking in, doing stuff. You became a lot more insular because you were focused on a task at something, sat there doing it. And when email came, it was even worse.

6:20In 1965, researchers at MIT discovered how to share files and messages between computers. But it wasn't until the mid-90s that free electronic mail started to become widely available. Nobody got up to go and talk to somebody. You'd send them an email. You know, there were probably only three desks down from you, but you wouldn't go and speak to them. You'd send them an email. It was just a complete shock, this instantaneous way of communicating without having to go through somebody's secretary or book a meeting. So it sort of felt a little bit scary, really. Today, we barely think about email.

6:57It just is. But as with so many other innovations that have revolutionized the way we work, electronic mail was once uncomfortably, excitingly new. I remember one day, this guy walking into the office that I was working in and asking me to move out of the way because he needed to get me onto electronic mail or email. And I didn't really know what this meant, but it basically meant that I would be able to send messages electronically to people all over the world. And so I said, oh, let's try the colleague in New Mexico. I came back in in the morning and I always remember this voice saying, you've got mail.

7:44And then I had one email. Hey, Lucy, good to hear from you. And I remember just like being completely blown away with excitement.

8:01Have no fear. Chosen Foods is here to defend your favorite foods from the forces of seedy oils and sketchy ingredients. With cooking oils, salad dressings, and mayo, all powered by the good fats from 100 % pure avocado oil and simple, delicious ingredients. Chosen Foods. Still waiting in line? Again? That's time you'll never get back. Save time and money with Stamps.com. Over 4 million businesses have skipped the line with Stamps.com. Join them to save up to 90 % off carrier rates from your computer or phone right now. Print postage for certified mail, registered mail, and packages in seconds.

8:38Then schedule a pickup right from your home or office. For a limited time, go to stamps.com and use code podcast for a free welcome gift. Taxes and fees apply.