I agree with Marissa Mayer, we should never set out to have teams working apart from each other and, if I had the experience that she has had via Google I would have sent the same "memo" to all Yahoo! staff as well.
When Marissa Mayer sent out the email (well, more accurately when it was leakd and I saw it reported) my initial reaction was, "Duh, of course she'd say that, it's what they do at Google!" ... no, really, the worlds largest, most successful "cloud" company operates very strictly on a "work next to your colleagues" principle as outlined by Eric Schmidt way back when:
Pack them in. Almost every project: at Google is a team project, and teams have to communicate. The best way to make communication easy is to put team members within a few feet of each other. The result is that virtually everyone at Google shares an office. This way, when a programmer needs to confer with a colleague, there is immediate access: no telephone tag, no e-mail delay, no waiting for a reply. Of course, there are many conference rooms that people can use for detailed discussion so that they don't disturb their office mates. Even the CEO shared an office at Google for several months after he arrived. Sitting next to a knowledgeable employee was an incredibly effective educational experience
(source: http://1000advices.com/guru/organization_cs_google_10rules.html)
One of the pillars of "good team work" (you define that as you see fit) in my mind has always been colocation, but does it really work?
According to the research by Mike Eccles, Joanne Smith, Maureen Tanner, Jean-Paul Van Belle and Stephan van der Watt as published by IBM in
"The Impact of Collocation on the Effectiveness of Agile is Development Teams", yes:
A key recommendation arising from the findings is that managers should not only consider collocating team members with
each other, but investigate the possibility of collocation with other teams in an open plan environment, as this contributes to the feeling of connectivity and involvement that is shared within the environment.
(source:
http://www.ibimapublishing.com/journals/CIBIMA/2010/959194/959194.pdf)
Also Marina Mendonça Natalino Zenuna1, Geilson Loureirob and Claudiano Sales Araujo,
"The Effects of Teams’ Co-location on Project Performance":
Study findings indicate that the NPD with co-located teams achieves a shorter lead time and a higher productivity when compared to a NPD with not co-located teams. There is no empirical evidence found in this study which indicates that colocation impacts quality. However, besides co-location, others project’s factors, as team manager, team experience among others could be influented these results.
(source: "
big URL - leads to a PDF")
After reading that it's not surprising that Mayer, who grew up in Google, understands the success that comes from this rule.
Of course, nNot everyone agrees with Marrisa Mayer - Jole Kotkin of the Financial Times sums up the
major arguments against insisting on not working from home. But then there's Jean-Louis Gassée of the Guardian with a counter view,
"The Marissa Mayer turnaround"
So what's the big reason for all this -
your teams will produce what you want with higher quality and on time.
Who doesn't want that?
How do you currently work AND more importantly, how do you think you should work at your office?
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