Open workplaces are all over the place these days, and with elements like employee work lounges, collaboration pods, and even nap rooms, what’s not to like? Yet despite all the benefits of open offices (and the many innovative concepts), there are just as many criticisms of this type of layout....

This article focuses on the remote manager – and I’m not talking about the guy sitting down the hall in the big corner office who is psychologically distant and intimidating. I’m talking about the manager supervising staff members who are spread across multiple remote locations - something I’ve...

The monthly unemployment rate gets a lot of attention from the Wall Street Journal, CNBC, and of course from the Federal Reserve. But there is another side of the employment coin that does not get as much attention. Still, it is a concern that is equally important to our nation’s economic...

Several years ago, I worked on a survey of employees for an organization, including a number of lawyers. Nearly unanimously, their replies indicated that they could not work in an open office because they required privacy for their jobs. That certainly seems reasonable. After all, there’s a lot of...

I had an interesting conversation last week with a friend who works in an open office. Her coworker apparently marinates herself in perfume that smells like buttered popcorn and coconut before coming into the office. So I decided that now is the time to follow up on my first workplace manners column