原創：顰兒翻譯
首發於2020年 12 月 9 日
首發於顰兒說英語微信公眾號
致敬外刊原文提供者Fred
篇首語：
自2020年10月19日，每周帶您讀五篇外刊，今天是第 33 篇。
該筆記著作權歸顰兒翻譯所有，如需轉載，請聯繫本人。
Here’s what the office of 2021 should look like
2021年辦公室新布局
2021年的辦公室會是怎樣的呢
2021年的辦公室布局會如何呢
Staff need space for ultra-quiet working away from noise and colleagues
Very little of consequence typically happens in a nanosecond.
Yet in the wake of promising Covid vaccine news, it hasn’t taken much longer than that for some bosses to predict that workers will be hauled out of their homes and back to the office sooner than expected.
There is 「no question」 that firms will start pulling people back the moment a vaccine hits, Lewis Horne told a Californian newspaper the other day.
顰兒筆記：
員工需要一個遠離噪音、遠離同事、超級安靜的工作空間
nanosecond納秒
極其細微的改變往往發生在一納秒之間。
in the wake of 隨後
Be hauled out of their homes 被拉出家門、拖出家門
sooner than expected.比預期的日期要早
Back to the office 回到辦公室、回去辦公
There is 「no question」 毫無疑問、確定無疑、毋庸置疑
the moment 一……就
the other day千萬不要理解成另一天、某一天，the other day means several days before，即：前幾天、幾天前、不久之前
Mr Horne might say that. He is a top executive at the US commercial real estate giant CBRE, and responsible for its business in southern California, where office occupancy has this year reportedly dropped by an area equal to that inside two Empire State Buildings.
But he has a point. The question is, when we do go back to the office, what should that office look like?
Let’s assume that employers listen to the 72 per cent of office workers from 10 countries who recently told researchers they want to keep working at home post-crisis, mostly for about two days a week.
That is a big assumption, but a cheering one for those who like the idea of doing their jobs at home and in the office. Done well, this hybrid way of working could end a lot of what was hopeless in the office buildings that emptied at the start of the pandemic, starting with their rows of open-plan desks.
These were supposed to foster teamwork and productive chats, which is precisely what some types of work need — at times. But open-plan designs also force workers to endure a vexing amount of noise, distraction and lack of privacy, as studies have shown for decades.
顰兒筆記：
top executive高管
commercial real estate giant 商業地產巨頭
Sb have a point 某人說的有道理
CBRE高管Lewis Horne 認為只要有效的疫苗研發出來，大家就該回去上班了。今年辦公室佔有率下降顯著，空置面積有兩個帝國大廈那麼多。其實他說的有道理，如果真的有了疫苗，那麼公司肯定會勒令員工打了疫苗，拿了陰性證明，趕緊回去上班。現在的問題是什麼呢？如果大家都會去上班，辦公室應該怎麼布置呢？以前的那種寬敞開闊的布局肯定不安全了，萬一有人再感染了病毒，豈不是一連串反應了。
office building寫字樓
open-plan desk開放式工位 office desk 辦公室的工位、辦公桌
open-plan office開放式辦公室
Foster 促進
at times 偶爾、有時、間或
open-plan design開放設計
a vexing amount of noise 大量煩人的噪音
lack of privacy毫無隱私
Things have grown worse as companies have cut costs and floorspace.
「Twenty years ago, the average worker could expect about 25 square metres each; today it is less than 10,」 writes Gideon Haigh in a new book charting office history, The Momentous, Uneventful Day.
Mr Haigh thinks one reason working from home has proved popular this year is that it has restored the privacy workers have lost over the past half century. I agree. It also seems likely that hybrid workers will be coming into the office mainly to meet other colleagues. So why not convert some open-plan space into something sorely missing in a lot of offices: readily available meeting rooms. Since some in the team will be at home, hybrid meeting rooms will need decent WiFi for Zooming and enough power sockets to recharge several laptops at a time.
Speaking of Zooming, the hybrid working office is likely to need more dedicated space for people to take part in video calls or the webinars that seem certain to last beyond the pandemic.
顰兒筆記：
當公司縮減成本cut costs，減少辦公面積floorspace的時候，事情變得更糟了 things have grown worse。
20年前，每個員工平均佔地25平米，現在只有可憐的10平米的面積。
Momentous重大的、深遠影響的
Uneventful 無驚人事件的、平靜的
Haigh 先生認為：長達半個世紀，員工在公司辦公毫無隱私，今年居家辦公流行至此，原因之一其保護了員工隱私。對此，作者表示贊同。貌似大家去辦公室就是為了見見同事。
coming into the office進入辦公室
sorely 非常
readily available meeting rooms隨時可用的會議室
Decent 好的、恰當的、體面的
power sockets電源插座
at a time 一次、每次、逐一、同時
會議室，無線網絡要夠好，保證連接Zoom，電源插座要充足，保證幾臺筆記本同時充電。
Speaking of 提及、談到、說起來
video calls 視頻電話
Webinars 網絡會議
last beyond the pandemic 持續到疫情之後
And since Zoom and its rivals are far from perfect, I like to think they will be replaced by a cheaper version of the high-end telepresence rooms that make virtual meetings feel more like the real thing. Apps that let you quickly see who is in the office and who isn’t will be vital. Likewise, while open-plan desks make it hard to do work requiring deep, focused thinking, so does a home with a toddler or two in it. So more open-plan space could be transformed into something else most offices lack: ultra-quiet areas where people can easily work uninterrupted for hours at a time.
What else? 「Hotwalls」 might be useful. That’s a big screen connected to an always-on video camera that some firms have used for years to keep distant colleagues in the loop. In a hybrid office, they could be put in spots like a lunch room so home workers could see what their colleagues are up to and chat with ones they like.
There are lots more possibilities. They won’t all suit each office. Ultimately, the pandemic has undermined devotees of scientific management guru Frederick Taylor who think workers need the constant surveillance offered by open-plan desks. But it has also caused enough economic pain to induce even greater cost-cutting. There is, though, a chance for hybrid working to turn the office into a vastly better version of what it was before Covid-19.
顰兒筆記：
far from perfect 遠遠不夠完美
telepresence遠程呈現、遙現
virtual meetings 虛擬會議
toddler學步兒童
開放式工位，職工很難精力深入思考問題，家有小屁孩的也有類似煩惱。
always-on video camera 永不掉線攝像頭
What sb are up to 某人在做什麼
Guru 專家、領袖、權威
24小時在線攝像頭+超大監控屏＋開放式工位，只為了監督員工。啊哈，真夠下血本的。可是真的有效嗎？
想起朋友疫情期間居家辦公，老闆要求一整天在線視頻會議，時刻盯著員工有沒有偷懶，很是無語。
如果把開放式工位改成一個個小隔間，安靜無比，遠離喧囂，員工就可以安心工作了嗎？我看未必，認真的員工在任何情況下都會認真工作，不認真的員工總有辦法偷懶的。
更多文章推薦
Stop 獵殺野生動物，你已構成生態滅絕罪
顰兒外刊閱讀筆記DAY5：微軟與亞馬遜的太空之爭
外刊解析：走進Z世代的球迷世界
外刊解析：辛辛苦苦為公司賣命十年，拿到年終獎一看，怒了