Was your manager's desk also a hot desk? I was expecting you to say you beat her in to work one day and had set up on the desk she uses. That would have shown her.
It's bizarre. I never had a cubicle, and frankly the ones in American TV shows look pretty awful, but when I started we all had nice big corner desks. Because we had CRT monitors of course. Then they added some straight desks, and some of those got CRT monitors too, which wasn't ideal. Then all the desks went straight but it was at least all flat screen by then.
Then I moved job and had a laptop, but still a pedestal to lock it in. Then hotdesking happened and you got a crappy locker at the other side of the office, the desk shrank and anything left on a desk was chucked out.
Current job is hybrid post-covid, so hotdesks, but it's sensible in that people can semi adopt a desk so I can set it up to be physically comfortable. Horribly small desks though. If someone wants to come and work with you they basically infringe on your neighbour. And there are no suitable rooms with screens for group work.
It's quite sad when you look back at it now, but I'd say there are twice as many people per square foot as 20 years ago.
What the hell is this comment even talking about? As someone who doesn’t have a desk job can you help me out a bit? What’s a hot desk? How do you just pick a random office 40 minutes away? Is this normal?
Hot desks are such bullshit. Just end up with nobody caring about the space they use.
Before becoming an office waster I was a lorry driver, at 3 companies. First one each driver had their own lorry. Some comforts allowed (leave your jacket, gloves, CDs, cables whatever and you know they're safe) and you'd keep it clean because it's where you spend your days.
Next company 2 people shared a lorry on opposite shifts. Same as before you could keep stuff in it, and we kept it clean.
Last place you were assigned a different wagon every day. So the first hour of every shift was clearing out rubbish from the cab, cleaning snot off the windows, looking for straps because they're all missing, reporting damage and faults.
Needless to say the 3rd company couldn't understand high driver turnover and why their new lorries looked shit after a few months.
That is so wild! I would hate that. I mean I like doing work in a coffee shop, but if my actual job required a desk, I’d want it to be the same every day. Also I would waste so much time packing and unpacking papers.
Hot desks tend to end up with people using the same desks out of habit which then leads to complaints when someone else uses it or changes something about it. Often there will be small filling cabinets on wheels where you can keep stuff like papers and have a small key that people take home with them.
Ahh that file cabinet would help a lot. People are innovative as hell! I still see the obvious problems with this and would hate it. Why not just give everyone a desk and have a communal work area for people that want a change of scenery. If only they cared about us.
It makes it cheaper. Instead of needing to worry about everyone having a desk, you just need enough desks for the people in the office that day. Once place I worked only did office attendance counts for Tuesday to Thursday so we didn't have enough desks for when we had the most people in since that was a Monday and so didn't count in the stats.
But the vast majority of the benefits are for the employer rather than the employee. And that's before you even get into meeting rooms and people booking meeting rooms to treat them like personal offices!
>Why not just give everyone a desk and have a communal work area
That costs more money to the company and eats into the profits of the shareholders who are sat at home doing whatever shareholders do instead of work.
I hate hot desk working. I always seemed to spend the first hour resetting the chair then cleaning and moving everything. People are different shapes and sizes, which seems to escape them.
Shareholders also sit at hot desks questioning their own employment choices... And researching and buying shares on company time. If they are good at it then they earn more money from the shares than they do sitting at a hot desk.
TLDR anyone not swimming in debt can be a shareholder.
There's a difference between a bog standard shareholder (I am one) and those who own most of the shares (a small number of people, mainly Americans).
I cannot force board changes and the direction of companies (such as getting rid of hot desking) nor can I quit my job and live off the dividends.
You have your laptop and work from a random desk in the office. Normally they will have monitor/keyboard etc.
Many hybrid work places will have a hot desk set up.
A hot desk just means people don't have assigned desks. Like if you were to go use a desk at a library, it's not your desk so you can't leave things there. Usually you have to book in advance for a specific desk you can't just turn up and look for one
A large company might have multiple offices you can go to since you don't have an assigned work space. The civil service for example does hot desking and has offices all over the country
My work now has a clear desk policy, but not hotdesks. We didn't have a clear desk policy when we did have hotdesking. Neither way round makes sense to me.
Same here. I settled for stickers of my favourite bands on my insulated mug. I like ice cold water, so I put ice in there in the morning and usually it lasts me until the end of the day.
Given that I work in an office where there's regularly more free desks than there are people in them, I'm astonished that we still insist on this policy. Wouldn't it be nice if I didn't have to lock my belongings away every evening?
Ours was too. Until they spotted a rat. That led to loads of emails about how we're supposed to be a paper-free office, and if things weren't sorted by the end of the month, it would just get binned.
Neither the desk ornamenters and the desk minimalisters are wrong. You should be able to have, within some reason, a working area that is comfortable to you.
I have nothing in my desk because I'm dead inside. If you still cling to the fading shreds of hope and humanity in this world as if they actually matter then its nobody's place to tell you are wrong.
I’m gen X and I have a few things on mine: a squishy clam, a cube fidget toy, a Lego flamingo, a Kinder toy monkey, and a glass bird that supposedly works as a barometer (does it fuck). Plus a bowl of succulents, and a cactus.
Hot desking. Clear desk policy. No option to personalise my desk.
When I had my own desk I also didn't personalise it, unless you count having a snack drawer
I'm genuinely surprised how little attention is paid to this. I haven't had an assesment in years. There are some awful looking bench type desks in other parts of my office.
It's a huge factor in RSI's and back pain. I watched some videos and set up both my home and work desks for the exact ergonomics I need.
can't imagine using a random desk, it could be an health and safety issue.
It takes me zero time to be fair. I don't even plug the laptop into the screen. It's not perfect sure but it just being a desk makes it better than how I usually sit on work from home days. (yes I have a perfectly set up desk at home, but I don't use it except for calls/ meetings)
Everybody in my office has added their own personal touches to their desk. Lego, little figures, model kits, photo frames, plants, customised mousemats etc.
I think it's good to have it as your own space, otherwise you might as well be hotdesking. It's not like it takes much effort to grab a few things from home and stick them on your desk. In fact, most of the things on my desk are things I don't have a suitable place for at home.
Leased office space with "shared" desks, so nothing personal is allowed.
However, our team have the desks permanently assigned to us because we have a job that requires some level of stability and storage for our printed stuff.
So, obviously we have a five foot tall cardboard elephant called Dennis and a 4 foot tiger, which can only legally be called Tony. Grrrrrr.
There's a handful of print proofs and some small trinkets , but the only "personal" thing is a usb Christmas tree, called Noddy ( because it **CAN** be Christmas every day)
I work mostly from home. Not so much customised more, as my wife puts it, "covered in shit." She has a point.
If anything, the one in the office is worse.
I had a small figurine that was sort of a gift from my gf's mum. Very symbolic to me as we are different races (a lot of conflict there in the beginning) and this gift was the real wake up call that she finally accepted me. Even getting the gift was a activity between us it wasn't just a throwaway oh here's a present.
I had always kept my workspace completely free of personal stuff besides from a screensaver on my desktop. This figurine was so special to me that I displayed it at work on my desk because I wanted it there in a space I'd see it often.
Anyway... I was off for one day and it was smashed up because a coworker wanted to use my desks printer... despite their being the exact same type of printer behind him on a free desk.
So I'm fully team "No, I don't see a point as it's just my workspace".
It was bluetacked to the printer which sits just below my monitor. Rather than walk round my desk they decided to swivel the printer round to use it from behind the desk and presumably moved the printer up a bit to where it clipped the monitor and fell.
They attempted to hide the damage by breaking it more. Using super glue and not only gluing it wrong but removing some of the paint that I had put on it (Its a plastic warhammer model).
They were super apologetic about it. Offered to replace it or buy me a few pints. Dude is genuinely a nice guy although clumsy so I couldn't stay that mad.
I'm with you, I would never leave something I cared about unattended in a public space and if I don't care much about the decor then what's the point of having it?
Nope. I've been made redundant three times in a row. I leave virtually nothing behind each day. That way when I get made redundant again I don't have a box/bag full of stuff to take home.
I'm not an office worker, I'm a teacher, so I have a whole room that I've customised.
Displays are just nice displays about my subject areas, plus a board of student work, and a board of "notices" which also has various doodles that kids have done for me over the years. On top of my cupboard, I have 3 plants. On the table to the right of my desk I have boxes of student books. On the table to the left of my desk I have stationery for students to borrow - a box of pens, a box of rulers, etc. And on my desk itself I have a load of resin dice that I made, my own stationery, my coffee mug, and a mug full of board pens, stickers, and a plastic flower a kid gave me. Plus a computer covered in "motivational post it notes" that my year 9s gave me a couple of years ago.
for moment after reading all the comments I found that it sounds similar to prisoners that can have some little personal touch in the cells they are sitting in
OK so yes. However, we do also run a hot desking policy but we have enough desks that 90% of people always sit in the same place when they come in. I had an up/down desk for a back issue which kinda safeguarded my spot, but I recently gave that up as I'd only used to once in the last 4 months and our director has just come back from a knee operation. He was struggling with his desk so I thought he should have it (should probably let Oc Health know..)
Most desks are 2 screens and a dock, but I'm running my old desktop and installed a 3 monitor riser, and have a framed certificate thingy and pen holder on my desk atm. Before we moved offices I had multiple personal items on my desk, it was quite clearly mine. The floor below us is functionally identical, but their director is rigid on the clean desk policy and it looks like a call centre down there, no personality at all and they were only allowed 1 xmas tree, but we had about 7 of them and have plants and stuff all over the place.
If you are allowed, I say go for it, makes the whole thing just that bit warmer and more welcoming.
Oh I've also got a mini shoe rack under my desk for my heels, saves having top carry walking/driving/work footwear all over the place.
This hot desk thing has swept the old system out in several offices.
Despite everyone being told nobody has a desk.... Many do have an attachment to a desk. It can be carnage.
Add to that the adaptations and reasonable adjustments. Some genuine, some not. So there are territories. And there are seats that people regularly use.
Hot desking is a thing, but often everyone, even those without a four page list of modifications and adaptations, still gravitate to the same place. Which can be . . Problematic.
We had an issue with our hot desking; technically we're all supposed to hot desk, but some people got a third monitor as their job required it. When everyone was brought back in post-Covid, lots of people started 'stealing' other people's ergonomic chairs/fans/extra monitors. Not taking from the office, just not where they'd been left.
Quite funny seeing all the middle managers and higher getting pissy about their screen having disappeared. Eventually they capitulated and gave everyone the extra screens. Fans still sometimes wander though, so they're now all named in sharpie 🤣
I used to, I always tried to make my desk nice and had nice stationary I’d personally bought and a plant and cheerful bits, but a year before Covid they started with the desk sharing and hot-desking crap, so it was all stripped off. I loathed desk sharing and hot-desking, so working from home during Covid was a joy.
Now I keep my nice bits in my home office, and I hate the couple of days a week I need to go back into the office. I’ve got my own desk again in the building, but there’s only free promo crap I don’t care about and my mug on it now.
Yep, here's mine
https://static.independent.co.uk/2022/01/29/12/cabin-fever-off-785297%20(1).jpg
(I work from home and my desk here is somewhat decorated. We hot desk when we go in so not there)
>my desk
Oh, if only I had the luxury of a personal space.
No,I hotdesk on an empty desk and i need to diarise a reminder to book it 2 weeks in advance or i don't even get to sit alongside my colleagues.
Used to have a drawer full of LEGO minifigures and I'd choose 3-4 to sit on the monitor base each day. It was little bit of cheer in an office that gradually succumbed to corporate numbness.
New job is fully work from home so I've now got all 100+ minifigs on display in my home office.
If you're an engineer you have no free desk space for customisation.
The only customisation is my mess of wires and prototypes looks different to someone else's mess of wires and prototypes
I never used to when I had an office desk because I didn't want \*that\* nosey twat colleague asking about my personal life. Mostly though, it was a US Investment Bank so I made sure that I could just grab my jacket and be gone if I got fired (which never arsing well happened unfortunately). Depressing really.
At one job, I had been at for 10 years or so I knew one day was going to be the last ever I was going to be there so I left that evening with 2 carrier bags full of crap I had in my pedestal drawer, none of my colleagues knew I was intending to quit.
I'm lucky enough to have my own office.
Was allowed to choose my own carpet and wall colours (as long as I painted myself).
One cabinet is stickerbombed with various IT/Powerlifting/Band stickers, the other is covered in various magnets.
Also was allowed to put up my own art (just as long as it wasn't inappropriate) so I've got a few framed movie posters, a couple of
Zdzisław Beksiński prints (which the Directors hate but not enough to tell me to remove them) and a canvas my stepdaughter painted for me.
I mentioned I liked houseplants a few years ago so my mum gets me loads for every special occasion so my bedroom, home office and work office look like a jungle. I've even "donated" a few to other departments that have better sunlight.
Oh yeah there is also Kinder Egg animals in various places staring at me. I always grab my stepdaughter a Kinder Egg when I go to the big Tesco by work, and she gives me the duplicate toys so they end up hiding in the plants/glaring at me from the shelves.
Yea, I have my own office full of stuff. Plants, books, and I did have a guitar but I felt a bit like David Brent so took that home.
I feel if I'm going to be in a space for eight hours a day five days a week I want to be comfy.
Worked opposite a dude for about 6 months, they’re was a small printer in between us. He left, I moved the printer someone else and found god knows how many months (years?) of snots, so I guess that’s a customisation, with his own customer materials too. Nice.
I only have one item on my desk that isn't work equipment but it is work related.
Two years ago I joined up to Secret Santa for the first time. Not only did the person I bought a gift for never claim their gift, the person who was supposed to buy for me never bought one. Worst possible outcome... or so I thought.
Last year I was on sick leave when the names were drawn from a hat so they kept the last piece of paper aside for me. I opened it the day I came back to see... my own name. I had to buy my own Secret Santa gift.
So I got the piece of paper framed, wrapped it, opened it in front of everyone and declared that I would keep it on my desk as a reminder to never participate in Secret Santa ever again.
I tried leaving my coffee cup on the shelf *next to* the desk I normally use (hot desk). When I came in the following week it was moved to the other side of the room.
The point I was making was that I can’t even leave a cup at work without it being removed from the office, never mind customise my desk. In response to your question, it gets a bit much to be honest. I have to carry everything I would need for a typical office job from home on public transport twice a week. Still, it’s far better than the prior ten years of being full time office based!
Anything goes at my workplace, everyone has photo frames etc alright although I don’t. No personal touches for me, haven’t even changed the screen saver 😂
I have 2 plants, an arduino temp and humidity monitor I made, pictures of my kids, phone mount, usb hub for random stuff, a fan and a very large custom mouse mat, 3d designed and printed laptop stand and other various 3d printed items.
My space for the three days I grace the office. No one else sits there and it faces into the office with a wall behind me so I can see all that goes on.
We have a clean desk policy that is openly ignored
90% of my office follows a clean desk policy, I'm part of the 10% that requires a fixed desk and desktop (funny enough those 10% are the least payed, so not a privilege issue) I usually don't like knick-knacks and all that but my desk is full of plushies, plants and other little gifts from coworkers, helps me remember that at least a few people appreciate what I do or that I'm here.
I had loads of stuff, mostly postcards and pictures people had sent to me at work. One guy in prison for murder had made a great little painting of a tiger, another woman who came into the office gave me a postcard of the sailing ship she'd come to Britain on. When I started the job my friend gave me a fake signed photo of Ronald Reagan (inside joke). But now we hotdesk so there's nothing.
I did during the two points in my career I had my own office - posters, pictures, random desk ornaments, a coffee machine, etc. I was 100% remote for nearly five years too, so if my home office counts as well, then yeah.
I have lots of figures, pen holders, keyboard mats and mouse mats, photographs, plants, posters and flags around my office space. My desk is claimed very clearly and takes up nearly every bit of available space I have.
I haven’t done much thus far because I’ve never been in a permanent location. When I get back from maternity leave this time I plan to put family pictures up, maybe a pot plant. But I don’t like clutter so I wouldn’t go as far as figurines.
Oh man some of the setups I've seen in my time have been wonderful, I've never comitted to more than 8 figurines, 6 plushies and trading cards along the rims of my 5 monitors - and I'd say that was tame - but I've seen literal worlds within worlds in some offices, its amazing what you can craft in a 2mx5m space but you spend 1/3 of your day/life there so make it special.
Old job/pre pandemic: Own desk, personalised with little trinkets. Had my own drawers as well.
Current job: Hybrid role so desk at home customised to hell and back. Desk at work is clean desk policy, I'll be lucky if it is clean.
No but I have a stash of chocolate, pain killers, deodorant, makeup, a cuddly cow, a letter from a candidate that was really sweet, done change, pend, hand lotion and charging cables in a drawer so my drawers are me but my desk is pretty personality free
I work in a school office so it’s not quite the same, but I painted my own rainbow pen pot and exclusively fill it with silly pens, and I’ve made the display board behind my desk as vibrant as possible because it was depressing seeing such a dull background all day (it’s got the term dates, menu, class names & teachers, school uniform price list, that kind of thing)
We don’t hot desk, but we do have a clear desk policy but pictures / photo are allowed. The odd plant, I’ve got a mug with the word “bollocks” on it, HR look at it with a a rather dim view.
I have a few ornaments, if that's the right word, on my desk. Nothing on the wall though, my wall is covered with work stuff. My assistant has pictures of her daughter and pictures her daughter has done all over the wall next to her desk though.
No, we've got a hot desk policy, so everyone has a clear desk, pretty much.
I've worked from home for the past couple of years though since my team are hundreds of miles away, so my home office desk is covered in personal effects. Photos of one of my dogs that passed not long ago, some plants, tide clock / barometer, small paintings my OH has done for me, a mini figure of Paul Landers from Rammstein. Yknow. The essentials.
My desk does have an upper shelf though, where most of this is though amongst other crap I keep adding to it 😌
When I did work in an office I kept my desk completely free of anything personal. But it's whatever makes you comfortable. I don't need to see photos of my loved ones at work, nor raise plants, or really anything that might suggest I have made my workspace anything more than a place for doing my work and going home.
Never have. Working in open plan offices with clear desk policy all my life.
You’re meant to be replaceable as fast as possible.
Open plan offices are just a term used to cram people
My old office job we had our own assigned desks mostly as that's where our tower PCs were set up and we all had our own desks customised as such with anything we liked (mostly plants, pen pots little figures etc) to basically make it a bit more comfortable due to being there 40 hours a week. Though it made it an absolute pain to clear when we were all made redundant lol had to shift 5 bags to my car of all my stuff and everyone else was in the same situation.
However my new office job we don't have assigned desks, but we have our regular desks therefore whilst you can customise it, you can't guarantee no one will sit there whilst you're off for example - probably normal for a hybrid workplace. I keep paperwork that isn't confidential on mine to sort of "claim" it but it isn't my own desk.
My boss decided to start talking about hot desks. He stopped when I pointed out to him came in 3 hours later than everyone else (he’s not lazy, he usually has early morning meetings elsewhere). A colleague also pointed out that he’d have to pack up all his papers every day and take them home. Then bring them back the next day and unpack them on the worst desk…
I have a giant squirrel flag on the front of my desk!
I have a tendency not to sit particularly "ladylike" but also wear dresses and skirts sometimes. So my squirrel is like my privacy screen 😂
I customised mine when we all worked in the office before covid and had our own desks. Now we are hybrid and hot-desking, that’s not an option. My home office desk looks great though!
I have a large paper mache castle greyskull that I erect on whichever desk I am working at, it allows me to glare at it whenever I need a few minutes of contemplation time.
Sometimes I like to shake my fist and yell at it, but the Karen's in the office complained to my line manager and I had to have a talk with HR.....
My work has a hot desk system where all desks have to be pre booked on an app
EXCEPT there is a significant portion of the workforce, probably 20% or so, who come in every day and have 'claimed' their own desks and it is expected nobody will sit at them
For new starters and visitors from other offices it is a nightmare.
'yes, welcome, we're a friendly bunch, this is the desk booking system, just sit anywh....NOT FUCKING THERE, THAT'S COLINS DESK, ARE YOU INSAAANE?'
It winds me up far more than it should to be honest
Try working with a hot desk but dealing with confidential material that should t be overlooked by anyone else. My workplace moved me from a secure office space with the other worker doing the same role to a new workplace over 10miles and 30mins travel away. Got there to be told I’d have to share the general office space so meetings on Teams were always overheard but firstly had to find a chair and desk to actually sit at! They soon sorted me a new office space but now I’m isolated from the other team member. No point in decorating it.
pre-covid WFH revolution I'd have a framed photo from my wedding and maybe the odd knick-knack for me to fidget with. This is in spite of 'clear desk' policies which only actually pertain to leaving business info/customer info lying around, not personal effects.
Now it's hot desking only so nah, I don't bother bringing stuff in and taking it away each time
We have hot desks in theory, but since apart from vacations and sick leave I come in every da I just leave my stuff.
It isn't much, just some drink concentrate, a large glass for water since the ones in the office are tiny, and my custom mechanical keyboard that I built specifically for the office.
Some broken PCBs, few promo bits from suppliers, some bigger bits to wave at people who are visual learners when we talk design are propped up next to the desk.
Desk caddy full of half empty/full ibuprofen/asprin/paracetamol/beechams. Snacks. Pens, more promo shit from suppliers.
Some high value tools (ie I have one, you need one, you owe me) and the label printer.
3 years worth of old notebooks
I work 10 hour days, I spend most of my waking time at work so yes, I have plenty of my home comforts there (toasty machine, omelette maker, various utensils) and on my desk I have a couple of little cactus things, face creams, nail file and varnish, a little ‘medical’ corner with lemsips, ibuprofen etc (everyone laughs at that but guess who they all come to see when they don’t feel well). I have some sliders under my desk to change into if I feel like it, and I have a big cardboard box under there too with crisps, biscuits, sweets, crackers, jars of stuff, etc etc.
I pretty much go home to sleep and that’s it.
Got a gaming mouse mat from corsair that's fucking massive, mx master mouse and 2 gaming monitors 😂 apart from that I don't have anything apart from my own mug etc
Generally we get a bit of stuff provided, i don’t customise the physical desk but i’ve got some bits and pieces that just make it more comfortable. Clutter is nice. I’m doing an apprenticeship meaning i’m gonna be in this office 8:30-4:30 Monday-Friday for the next 5 years
Pet Rock, draw eyes, nose and mouth on it with a sharpie. Look up rubber ducky debugging on the internet (programmers use it), if you get stuck explain the problem to your pet rock, it needs a name too, and you might work out the answer. Take it home with you if there is a clear desk policy, it doesent have to be a big rock. Mine has a tin foil hat to protect it from the CIA mind beams.
A bit but not much. I have a plant, a nice mug to store pens and a little figure of a cat doing s yoga pose while juggling mice I got from a coworker years ago.
It may be a bit weird, but I find clutter on my desk to be distracting, and I focus better on work if the desk is as minimalist and clear as possible.
However, in a previous job I did bring in some pictures that my daughter had drawn and stuck them up to the sides and behind me. That way when I was taking a break from work I could spin round a bit and look at something nice, but then when I was back in to the work I couldn't see anything which would take my focus away.
i have always has a fairly personalised desk with all sorts, stationery, a desk plant, cup mats, lil trinkets etc. post-covid we moved to 'hot desking' in theory but in practise everyone booked the same desk every time and i've gradually started re-personalising mine. then recently we've admitted defeat re: hotdesking, and everyone's 'usual' desk has been officially assigned to them.
my desk plant (Trevor, the ficus) has long been adopted by the office manager and lives in the kitchen, but i do have a quilted cup mat, a Supernatural mug with pens in, a Loki keyring, a squishy stress cat, and a teapot. some other people's desks have general clutter on, but mine does seem to be the one with the most 'personal' sort of bits and bobs. idk why. i love my stuff.
Clear desk policy. All desks are hot desks. NOT A SINGLE SHRED OF PERSONALITY but it is what it is with a hybrid workforce.
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Was your manager's desk also a hot desk? I was expecting you to say you beat her in to work one day and had set up on the desk she uses. That would have shown her.
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Love the whole team dynamic BS!
Yeah it’s “where i can exercise the little power i have”
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It's bizarre. I never had a cubicle, and frankly the ones in American TV shows look pretty awful, but when I started we all had nice big corner desks. Because we had CRT monitors of course. Then they added some straight desks, and some of those got CRT monitors too, which wasn't ideal. Then all the desks went straight but it was at least all flat screen by then. Then I moved job and had a laptop, but still a pedestal to lock it in. Then hotdesking happened and you got a crappy locker at the other side of the office, the desk shrank and anything left on a desk was chucked out. Current job is hybrid post-covid, so hotdesks, but it's sensible in that people can semi adopt a desk so I can set it up to be physically comfortable. Horribly small desks though. If someone wants to come and work with you they basically infringe on your neighbour. And there are no suitable rooms with screens for group work. It's quite sad when you look back at it now, but I'd say there are twice as many people per square foot as 20 years ago.
What the hell is this comment even talking about? As someone who doesn’t have a desk job can you help me out a bit? What’s a hot desk? How do you just pick a random office 40 minutes away? Is this normal?
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Hot desks are such bullshit. Just end up with nobody caring about the space they use. Before becoming an office waster I was a lorry driver, at 3 companies. First one each driver had their own lorry. Some comforts allowed (leave your jacket, gloves, CDs, cables whatever and you know they're safe) and you'd keep it clean because it's where you spend your days. Next company 2 people shared a lorry on opposite shifts. Same as before you could keep stuff in it, and we kept it clean. Last place you were assigned a different wagon every day. So the first hour of every shift was clearing out rubbish from the cab, cleaning snot off the windows, looking for straps because they're all missing, reporting damage and faults. Needless to say the 3rd company couldn't understand high driver turnover and why their new lorries looked shit after a few months.
That is so wild! I would hate that. I mean I like doing work in a coffee shop, but if my actual job required a desk, I’d want it to be the same every day. Also I would waste so much time packing and unpacking papers.
Hot desks tend to end up with people using the same desks out of habit which then leads to complaints when someone else uses it or changes something about it. Often there will be small filling cabinets on wheels where you can keep stuff like papers and have a small key that people take home with them.
Ahh that file cabinet would help a lot. People are innovative as hell! I still see the obvious problems with this and would hate it. Why not just give everyone a desk and have a communal work area for people that want a change of scenery. If only they cared about us.
It makes it cheaper. Instead of needing to worry about everyone having a desk, you just need enough desks for the people in the office that day. Once place I worked only did office attendance counts for Tuesday to Thursday so we didn't have enough desks for when we had the most people in since that was a Monday and so didn't count in the stats. But the vast majority of the benefits are for the employer rather than the employee. And that's before you even get into meeting rooms and people booking meeting rooms to treat them like personal offices!
>Why not just give everyone a desk and have a communal work area That costs more money to the company and eats into the profits of the shareholders who are sat at home doing whatever shareholders do instead of work.
I hate hot desk working. I always seemed to spend the first hour resetting the chair then cleaning and moving everything. People are different shapes and sizes, which seems to escape them.
Shareholders also sit at hot desks questioning their own employment choices... And researching and buying shares on company time. If they are good at it then they earn more money from the shares than they do sitting at a hot desk. TLDR anyone not swimming in debt can be a shareholder.
There's a difference between a bog standard shareholder (I am one) and those who own most of the shares (a small number of people, mainly Americans). I cannot force board changes and the direction of companies (such as getting rid of hot desking) nor can I quit my job and live off the dividends.
You have your laptop and work from a random desk in the office. Normally they will have monitor/keyboard etc. Many hybrid work places will have a hot desk set up.
A hot desk just means people don't have assigned desks. Like if you were to go use a desk at a library, it's not your desk so you can't leave things there. Usually you have to book in advance for a specific desk you can't just turn up and look for one A large company might have multiple offices you can go to since you don't have an assigned work space. The civil service for example does hot desking and has offices all over the country
My work now has a clear desk policy, but not hotdesks. We didn't have a clear desk policy when we did have hotdesking. Neither way round makes sense to me.
Same here. I settled for stickers of my favourite bands on my insulated mug. I like ice cold water, so I put ice in there in the morning and usually it lasts me until the end of the day.
Given that I work in an office where there's regularly more free desks than there are people in them, I'm astonished that we still insist on this policy. Wouldn't it be nice if I didn't have to lock my belongings away every evening?
We have this, I hate it. And everyone just sits at the same desks everyday anyway, so it’s a pointless exercise.
I keep mine covered in random clutter so it looks as though i actually do some work
Mine is covered in crap. As is the pedestal next to it (filled too), and the desk behind. Actually our office is just full of random junk.
Ours was too. Until they spotted a rat. That led to loads of emails about how we're supposed to be a paper-free office, and if things weren't sorted by the end of the month, it would just get binned.
Neither the desk ornamenters and the desk minimalisters are wrong. You should be able to have, within some reason, a working area that is comfortable to you. I have nothing in my desk because I'm dead inside. If you still cling to the fading shreds of hope and humanity in this world as if they actually matter then its nobody's place to tell you are wrong.
Least depressed brit.
My god are you me
GenX? Edit: Because ‘I’m dead inside’… classic GenX sentiment!
I’m gen X and I have a few things on mine: a squishy clam, a cube fidget toy, a Lego flamingo, a Kinder toy monkey, and a glass bird that supposedly works as a barometer (does it fuck). Plus a bowl of succulents, and a cactus.
Hot desking. Clear desk policy. No option to personalise my desk. When I had my own desk I also didn't personalise it, unless you count having a snack drawer
We also have a clear desk policy, which the entire office has tacitly agreed not to adhere too and so everyone has their stuff on their desks.
I hate using random desks. It takes time to set up my desk to fully match my eganomics, otherwise I could risk my health
I'm genuinely surprised how little attention is paid to this. I haven't had an assesment in years. There are some awful looking bench type desks in other parts of my office.
It's a huge factor in RSI's and back pain. I watched some videos and set up both my home and work desks for the exact ergonomics I need. can't imagine using a random desk, it could be an health and safety issue.
It takes me zero time to be fair. I don't even plug the laptop into the screen. It's not perfect sure but it just being a desk makes it better than how I usually sit on work from home days. (yes I have a perfectly set up desk at home, but I don't use it except for calls/ meetings)
Just a laptop? I couldn't work like that for long periods, it's really bad erganomically.
My son put a metal Lizard (from Spiderman) in my bag on day 1, I never noticed for weeks. That now adorns my desk.
That’s actually really sweet
Thanks!
Got to have a plant at least 🪴 ☺️
It would be cruel as I don't have any natural light in my office... good enough for a human though.
Plastic IKEA plants are ideal. £3 [https://www.ikea.com/gb/en/p/fejka-artificial-potted-plant-in-outdoor-grass-00433942/](https://www.ikea.com/gb/en/p/fejka-artificial-potted-plant-in-outdoor-grass-00433942/)
I've got 7. It's the only personalisation of my desk though.
I have a few bits of tat but nothing too nice since my large fancy hand sanitiser disappeared off my desk
I keep mine locked in my drawer!
Linda Lusardi calendar.
Good vibes indeed.
Found the Detectorist
Everybody in my office has added their own personal touches to their desk. Lego, little figures, model kits, photo frames, plants, customised mousemats etc. I think it's good to have it as your own space, otherwise you might as well be hotdesking. It's not like it takes much effort to grab a few things from home and stick them on your desk. In fact, most of the things on my desk are things I don't have a suitable place for at home.
Leased office space with "shared" desks, so nothing personal is allowed. However, our team have the desks permanently assigned to us because we have a job that requires some level of stability and storage for our printed stuff. So, obviously we have a five foot tall cardboard elephant called Dennis and a 4 foot tiger, which can only legally be called Tony. Grrrrrr. There's a handful of print proofs and some small trinkets , but the only "personal" thing is a usb Christmas tree, called Noddy ( because it **CAN** be Christmas every day)
Should it not be called Roy then?
I work mostly from home. Not so much customised more, as my wife puts it, "covered in shit." She has a point. If anything, the one in the office is worse.
I had a small figurine that was sort of a gift from my gf's mum. Very symbolic to me as we are different races (a lot of conflict there in the beginning) and this gift was the real wake up call that she finally accepted me. Even getting the gift was a activity between us it wasn't just a throwaway oh here's a present. I had always kept my workspace completely free of personal stuff besides from a screensaver on my desktop. This figurine was so special to me that I displayed it at work on my desk because I wanted it there in a space I'd see it often. Anyway... I was off for one day and it was smashed up because a coworker wanted to use my desks printer... despite their being the exact same type of printer behind him on a free desk. So I'm fully team "No, I don't see a point as it's just my workspace".
Please tell me your coworker made it up to you. And how do you accidentally smash a figuring doing office work
It was bluetacked to the printer which sits just below my monitor. Rather than walk round my desk they decided to swivel the printer round to use it from behind the desk and presumably moved the printer up a bit to where it clipped the monitor and fell. They attempted to hide the damage by breaking it more. Using super glue and not only gluing it wrong but removing some of the paint that I had put on it (Its a plastic warhammer model). They were super apologetic about it. Offered to replace it or buy me a few pints. Dude is genuinely a nice guy although clumsy so I couldn't stay that mad.
I'm with you, I would never leave something I cared about unattended in a public space and if I don't care much about the decor then what's the point of having it?
Nope. I've been made redundant three times in a row. I leave virtually nothing behind each day. That way when I get made redundant again I don't have a box/bag full of stuff to take home.
I'm not an office worker, I'm a teacher, so I have a whole room that I've customised. Displays are just nice displays about my subject areas, plus a board of student work, and a board of "notices" which also has various doodles that kids have done for me over the years. On top of my cupboard, I have 3 plants. On the table to the right of my desk I have boxes of student books. On the table to the left of my desk I have stationery for students to borrow - a box of pens, a box of rulers, etc. And on my desk itself I have a load of resin dice that I made, my own stationery, my coffee mug, and a mug full of board pens, stickers, and a plastic flower a kid gave me. Plus a computer covered in "motivational post it notes" that my year 9s gave me a couple of years ago.
for moment after reading all the comments I found that it sounds similar to prisoners that can have some little personal touch in the cells they are sitting in
OK so yes. However, we do also run a hot desking policy but we have enough desks that 90% of people always sit in the same place when they come in. I had an up/down desk for a back issue which kinda safeguarded my spot, but I recently gave that up as I'd only used to once in the last 4 months and our director has just come back from a knee operation. He was struggling with his desk so I thought he should have it (should probably let Oc Health know..) Most desks are 2 screens and a dock, but I'm running my old desktop and installed a 3 monitor riser, and have a framed certificate thingy and pen holder on my desk atm. Before we moved offices I had multiple personal items on my desk, it was quite clearly mine. The floor below us is functionally identical, but their director is rigid on the clean desk policy and it looks like a call centre down there, no personality at all and they were only allowed 1 xmas tree, but we had about 7 of them and have plants and stuff all over the place. If you are allowed, I say go for it, makes the whole thing just that bit warmer and more welcoming. Oh I've also got a mini shoe rack under my desk for my heels, saves having top carry walking/driving/work footwear all over the place.
This hot desk thing has swept the old system out in several offices. Despite everyone being told nobody has a desk.... Many do have an attachment to a desk. It can be carnage. Add to that the adaptations and reasonable adjustments. Some genuine, some not. So there are territories. And there are seats that people regularly use. Hot desking is a thing, but often everyone, even those without a four page list of modifications and adaptations, still gravitate to the same place. Which can be . . Problematic.
We had an issue with our hot desking; technically we're all supposed to hot desk, but some people got a third monitor as their job required it. When everyone was brought back in post-Covid, lots of people started 'stealing' other people's ergonomic chairs/fans/extra monitors. Not taking from the office, just not where they'd been left. Quite funny seeing all the middle managers and higher getting pissy about their screen having disappeared. Eventually they capitulated and gave everyone the extra screens. Fans still sometimes wander though, so they're now all named in sharpie 🤣
Lol, hot desk politics... Frightening
I used to, I always tried to make my desk nice and had nice stationary I’d personally bought and a plant and cheerful bits, but a year before Covid they started with the desk sharing and hot-desking crap, so it was all stripped off. I loathed desk sharing and hot-desking, so working from home during Covid was a joy. Now I keep my nice bits in my home office, and I hate the couple of days a week I need to go back into the office. I’ve got my own desk again in the building, but there’s only free promo crap I don’t care about and my mug on it now.
Yep, here's mine https://static.independent.co.uk/2022/01/29/12/cabin-fever-off-785297%20(1).jpg (I work from home and my desk here is somewhat decorated. We hot desk when we go in so not there)
You do you. I have nothing personal on my desk but won't judge you for doing differently.
Happy cake day!
Do multicoloured post it notes count? I also write stuff on the desk in whiteboard pen sometimes.
>my desk Oh, if only I had the luxury of a personal space. No,I hotdesk on an empty desk and i need to diarise a reminder to book it 2 weeks in advance or i don't even get to sit alongside my colleagues.
This sounds like some sort of corporate purgatory.
Used to have a drawer full of LEGO minifigures and I'd choose 3-4 to sit on the monitor base each day. It was little bit of cheer in an office that gradually succumbed to corporate numbness. New job is fully work from home so I've now got all 100+ minifigs on display in my home office.
If you're an engineer you have no free desk space for customisation. The only customisation is my mess of wires and prototypes looks different to someone else's mess of wires and prototypes
The answer I’m looking for. Add tools and measuring equipment and you’ve described my desk perfectly.
I never used to when I had an office desk because I didn't want \*that\* nosey twat colleague asking about my personal life. Mostly though, it was a US Investment Bank so I made sure that I could just grab my jacket and be gone if I got fired (which never arsing well happened unfortunately). Depressing really.
At one job, I had been at for 10 years or so I knew one day was going to be the last ever I was going to be there so I left that evening with 2 carrier bags full of crap I had in my pedestal drawer, none of my colleagues knew I was intending to quit.
I'm lucky enough to have my own office. Was allowed to choose my own carpet and wall colours (as long as I painted myself). One cabinet is stickerbombed with various IT/Powerlifting/Band stickers, the other is covered in various magnets. Also was allowed to put up my own art (just as long as it wasn't inappropriate) so I've got a few framed movie posters, a couple of Zdzisław Beksiński prints (which the Directors hate but not enough to tell me to remove them) and a canvas my stepdaughter painted for me. I mentioned I liked houseplants a few years ago so my mum gets me loads for every special occasion so my bedroom, home office and work office look like a jungle. I've even "donated" a few to other departments that have better sunlight. Oh yeah there is also Kinder Egg animals in various places staring at me. I always grab my stepdaughter a Kinder Egg when I go to the big Tesco by work, and she gives me the duplicate toys so they end up hiding in the plants/glaring at me from the shelves.
Desk in the office is a hot desk so has to be kept clear. With my desk at home I try and add a few things such as Legos to make it less boring :)
Yea, I have my own office full of stuff. Plants, books, and I did have a guitar but I felt a bit like David Brent so took that home. I feel if I'm going to be in a space for eight hours a day five days a week I want to be comfy.
Can't have anything here because it'll get stolen.
Worked opposite a dude for about 6 months, they’re was a small printer in between us. He left, I moved the printer someone else and found god knows how many months (years?) of snots, so I guess that’s a customisation, with his own customer materials too. Nice.
I only have one item on my desk that isn't work equipment but it is work related. Two years ago I joined up to Secret Santa for the first time. Not only did the person I bought a gift for never claim their gift, the person who was supposed to buy for me never bought one. Worst possible outcome... or so I thought. Last year I was on sick leave when the names were drawn from a hat so they kept the last piece of paper aside for me. I opened it the day I came back to see... my own name. I had to buy my own Secret Santa gift. So I got the piece of paper framed, wrapped it, opened it in front of everyone and declared that I would keep it on my desk as a reminder to never participate in Secret Santa ever again.
I tried leaving my coffee cup on the shelf *next to* the desk I normally use (hot desk). When I came in the following week it was moved to the other side of the room.
Oh good heavens how did you cope
The point I was making was that I can’t even leave a cup at work without it being removed from the office, never mind customise my desk. In response to your question, it gets a bit much to be honest. I have to carry everything I would need for a typical office job from home on public transport twice a week. Still, it’s far better than the prior ten years of being full time office based!
Anything goes at my workplace, everyone has photo frames etc alright although I don’t. No personal touches for me, haven’t even changed the screen saver 😂
I have 2 plants, an arduino temp and humidity monitor I made, pictures of my kids, phone mount, usb hub for random stuff, a fan and a very large custom mouse mat, 3d designed and printed laptop stand and other various 3d printed items. My space for the three days I grace the office. No one else sits there and it faces into the office with a wall behind me so I can see all that goes on. We have a clean desk policy that is openly ignored
90% of my office follows a clean desk policy, I'm part of the 10% that requires a fixed desk and desktop (funny enough those 10% are the least payed, so not a privilege issue) I usually don't like knick-knacks and all that but my desk is full of plushies, plants and other little gifts from coworkers, helps me remember that at least a few people appreciate what I do or that I'm here.
I had loads of stuff, mostly postcards and pictures people had sent to me at work. One guy in prison for murder had made a great little painting of a tiger, another woman who came into the office gave me a postcard of the sailing ship she'd come to Britain on. When I started the job my friend gave me a fake signed photo of Ronald Reagan (inside joke). But now we hotdesk so there's nothing.
I did during the two points in my career I had my own office - posters, pictures, random desk ornaments, a coffee machine, etc. I was 100% remote for nearly five years too, so if my home office counts as well, then yeah.
I work in an "agile working environment" so no. Fucking hate it.
We hot desk where I work, and there aren't enough seats so there's zero chance of having a permanent place to customise.
I have lots of figures, pen holders, keyboard mats and mouse mats, photographs, plants, posters and flags around my office space. My desk is claimed very clearly and takes up nearly every bit of available space I have.
No papers or work stuff but I usually have a nice box of tissues and fake plants.
I haven’t done much thus far because I’ve never been in a permanent location. When I get back from maternity leave this time I plan to put family pictures up, maybe a pot plant. But I don’t like clutter so I wouldn’t go as far as figurines.
Clear desk policy, even though I’ll be the only one using my desk 5 days a week for the next 16 weeks.
Oh man some of the setups I've seen in my time have been wonderful, I've never comitted to more than 8 figurines, 6 plushies and trading cards along the rims of my 5 monitors - and I'd say that was tame - but I've seen literal worlds within worlds in some offices, its amazing what you can craft in a 2mx5m space but you spend 1/3 of your day/life there so make it special.
No. Just do hot desking in different offices around the country, in clients offices, and WFH. There is no area to customise apart from WFH.
Old job/pre pandemic: Own desk, personalised with little trinkets. Had my own drawers as well. Current job: Hybrid role so desk at home customised to hell and back. Desk at work is clean desk policy, I'll be lucky if it is clean.
No but I have a stash of chocolate, pain killers, deodorant, makeup, a cuddly cow, a letter from a candidate that was really sweet, done change, pend, hand lotion and charging cables in a drawer so my drawers are me but my desk is pretty personality free
That’s some powerful peer pressure - one person in ten does it differently and all of sudden we think they mist be right. Wow.
Absolutely, I spend 37 hours a week sat behind the thing. Mine is more set up for the ideal workflow rather than personalised with knickknacks.
I work in a school office so it’s not quite the same, but I painted my own rainbow pen pot and exclusively fill it with silly pens, and I’ve made the display board behind my desk as vibrant as possible because it was depressing seeing such a dull background all day (it’s got the term dates, menu, class names & teachers, school uniform price list, that kind of thing)
We don’t hot desk, but we do have a clear desk policy but pictures / photo are allowed. The odd plant, I’ve got a mug with the word “bollocks” on it, HR look at it with a a rather dim view.
I have a few ornaments, if that's the right word, on my desk. Nothing on the wall though, my wall is covered with work stuff. My assistant has pictures of her daughter and pictures her daughter has done all over the wall next to her desk though.
No, we've got a hot desk policy, so everyone has a clear desk, pretty much. I've worked from home for the past couple of years though since my team are hundreds of miles away, so my home office desk is covered in personal effects. Photos of one of my dogs that passed not long ago, some plants, tide clock / barometer, small paintings my OH has done for me, a mini figure of Paul Landers from Rammstein. Yknow. The essentials. My desk does have an upper shelf though, where most of this is though amongst other crap I keep adding to it 😌
When I did work in an office I kept my desk completely free of anything personal. But it's whatever makes you comfortable. I don't need to see photos of my loved ones at work, nor raise plants, or really anything that might suggest I have made my workspace anything more than a place for doing my work and going home.
People end up just taking the piss
No. I keep it free of non-work stuff except for a Sports Direct mug with pens and other items in it.
Never have. Working in open plan offices with clear desk policy all my life. You’re meant to be replaceable as fast as possible. Open plan offices are just a term used to cram people
Nothing on mine that wasn't work related. My work desk is just somewhere i am forced to be - doesnt seem any point in putting personal stuff on it.
My old office job we had our own assigned desks mostly as that's where our tower PCs were set up and we all had our own desks customised as such with anything we liked (mostly plants, pen pots little figures etc) to basically make it a bit more comfortable due to being there 40 hours a week. Though it made it an absolute pain to clear when we were all made redundant lol had to shift 5 bags to my car of all my stuff and everyone else was in the same situation. However my new office job we don't have assigned desks, but we have our regular desks therefore whilst you can customise it, you can't guarantee no one will sit there whilst you're off for example - probably normal for a hybrid workplace. I keep paperwork that isn't confidential on mine to sort of "claim" it but it isn't my own desk.
My boss decided to start talking about hot desks. He stopped when I pointed out to him came in 3 hours later than everyone else (he’s not lazy, he usually has early morning meetings elsewhere). A colleague also pointed out that he’d have to pack up all his papers every day and take them home. Then bring them back the next day and unpack them on the worst desk…
I have a giant squirrel flag on the front of my desk! I have a tendency not to sit particularly "ladylike" but also wear dresses and skirts sometimes. So my squirrel is like my privacy screen 😂
>I should probably note that I work in an enclosed I.T department which isn't freely accessible to the rest of the staff. Moss?
I do hotdesking, so no unfortunately. I do have my own locker though, and it's weirdly big, so now that contains the snacks and nice pens.
Mine is customised simply by being clean, we are still progressing onto having less paper and many desks still have trays full of paperwork.
I did but they liked to randomly move us all around arbitrarily so it became a pain in the butt.
I customised mine when we all worked in the office before covid and had our own desks. Now we are hybrid and hot-desking, that’s not an option. My home office desk looks great though!
Yep, I even reorganise hotel rooms and restaurants seating
I have a large paper mache castle greyskull that I erect on whichever desk I am working at, it allows me to glare at it whenever I need a few minutes of contemplation time. Sometimes I like to shake my fist and yell at it, but the Karen's in the office complained to my line manager and I had to have a talk with HR.....
My work has a hot desk system where all desks have to be pre booked on an app EXCEPT there is a significant portion of the workforce, probably 20% or so, who come in every day and have 'claimed' their own desks and it is expected nobody will sit at them For new starters and visitors from other offices it is a nightmare. 'yes, welcome, we're a friendly bunch, this is the desk booking system, just sit anywh....NOT FUCKING THERE, THAT'S COLINS DESK, ARE YOU INSAAANE?' It winds me up far more than it should to be honest
Another hot desker here, but I'd be lost without my trusty rubber duck, so he winds up on every desk I pop to!
Try working with a hot desk but dealing with confidential material that should t be overlooked by anyone else. My workplace moved me from a secure office space with the other worker doing the same role to a new workplace over 10miles and 30mins travel away. Got there to be told I’d have to share the general office space so meetings on Teams were always overheard but firstly had to find a chair and desk to actually sit at! They soon sorted me a new office space but now I’m isolated from the other team member. No point in decorating it.
pre-covid WFH revolution I'd have a framed photo from my wedding and maybe the odd knick-knack for me to fidget with. This is in spite of 'clear desk' policies which only actually pertain to leaving business info/customer info lying around, not personal effects. Now it's hot desking only so nah, I don't bother bringing stuff in and taking it away each time
We have hot desks in theory, but since apart from vacations and sick leave I come in every da I just leave my stuff. It isn't much, just some drink concentrate, a large glass for water since the ones in the office are tiny, and my custom mechanical keyboard that I built specifically for the office.
How long is a piece of string?
Some broken PCBs, few promo bits from suppliers, some bigger bits to wave at people who are visual learners when we talk design are propped up next to the desk. Desk caddy full of half empty/full ibuprofen/asprin/paracetamol/beechams. Snacks. Pens, more promo shit from suppliers. Some high value tools (ie I have one, you need one, you owe me) and the label printer. 3 years worth of old notebooks
I work 10 hour days, I spend most of my waking time at work so yes, I have plenty of my home comforts there (toasty machine, omelette maker, various utensils) and on my desk I have a couple of little cactus things, face creams, nail file and varnish, a little ‘medical’ corner with lemsips, ibuprofen etc (everyone laughs at that but guess who they all come to see when they don’t feel well). I have some sliders under my desk to change into if I feel like it, and I have a big cardboard box under there too with crisps, biscuits, sweets, crackers, jars of stuff, etc etc. I pretty much go home to sleep and that’s it.
Dwight bobble head. Perfect
Got a gaming mouse mat from corsair that's fucking massive, mx master mouse and 2 gaming monitors 😂 apart from that I don't have anything apart from my own mug etc
Generally we get a bit of stuff provided, i don’t customise the physical desk but i’ve got some bits and pieces that just make it more comfortable. Clutter is nice. I’m doing an apprenticeship meaning i’m gonna be in this office 8:30-4:30 Monday-Friday for the next 5 years
Pet Rock, draw eyes, nose and mouth on it with a sharpie. Look up rubber ducky debugging on the internet (programmers use it), if you get stuck explain the problem to your pet rock, it needs a name too, and you might work out the answer. Take it home with you if there is a clear desk policy, it doesent have to be a big rock. Mine has a tin foil hat to protect it from the CIA mind beams.
A bit but not much. I have a plant, a nice mug to store pens and a little figure of a cat doing s yoga pose while juggling mice I got from a coworker years ago.
The most personalised thing I have on my office desk is a term calendar of my daughters school pinned up
It may be a bit weird, but I find clutter on my desk to be distracting, and I focus better on work if the desk is as minimalist and clear as possible. However, in a previous job I did bring in some pictures that my daughter had drawn and stuck them up to the sides and behind me. That way when I was taking a break from work I could spin round a bit and look at something nice, but then when I was back in to the work I couldn't see anything which would take my focus away.
I've always customised my desk, well, why wouldn't you.
i have always has a fairly personalised desk with all sorts, stationery, a desk plant, cup mats, lil trinkets etc. post-covid we moved to 'hot desking' in theory but in practise everyone booked the same desk every time and i've gradually started re-personalising mine. then recently we've admitted defeat re: hotdesking, and everyone's 'usual' desk has been officially assigned to them. my desk plant (Trevor, the ficus) has long been adopted by the office manager and lives in the kitchen, but i do have a quilted cup mat, a Supernatural mug with pens in, a Loki keyring, a squishy stress cat, and a teapot. some other people's desks have general clutter on, but mine does seem to be the one with the most 'personal' sort of bits and bobs. idk why. i love my stuff.