An article popped into my feed from History the other day. The headline grabbed me immediately: “Why the Inventor of the Cubicle Came to Despise His Own Creation”. If you’ve ever worked in a cubicle, as did I, that headline may have restored a little of your faith, as it did mine. My faith was bolstered still more when I read the first paragraph:
How do you envision corporate hell? It probably involves fluorescent light, a micromanaging boss and a tiny, impersonal cubicle. But the office layout that’s come to represent the worst in work was actually designed to bring out the best in workers. When they debuted in the 1960s, cubicles were supposed to make offices breezier, less confined and more efficient … Propst watched in horror as an invention intended to liberate American office workers was used to fence them in. “Not all organizations are intelligent and progressive,” he lamented. “Lots are run by crass people. They make little, bitty cubicles and stuff people in them. Barren, rathole places.”
Well, there you go. The man had a heart and a conscience. His name was Robert Propst. He died in 2000 at age 79. Since I wanted to talk with him about his creation, what happened to it, and how his intentions were perverted, I got in the Wayback Machine and traveled to the late 1970s when Probst, who’d founded Probst Company in 1953, was working for MillerKnoll, Inc., which did business as Herman Miller.
Given the time of my visit, I dressed in a leisure suit and a polyester shirt unbuttoned to my navel. And I had my hair blow-dried and sprayed so it looked like a helmet. I arrived at the Miller plant in Zeeland, Michigan, announced myself at the reception desk, and asked to see Mr. Probst. What follows is a transcript of the interview I conducted with him. It’s been edited for brevity and Clarity:
Me: Good morning, Bob. How are you?
Bob: Why are you dressed like that?
Me: What? I thought I looked … Never mind that right now. How are you doing?
Bob: To tell you the truth, I’m getting a little disillusioned.
Me: Why? What’s going on?
Bob: After they axed that bum, George Nelson, and I designed the Action Office II, I thought we were going places. But that was rendered FUBAR by Doug Ball at Haworth, another chooch. Then Steelcase and Knoll really screwed things up.
Me: How so?
Bob: The designs were supposed to be flexible to let people set up their own workspaces the way they wanted ‘em.
Me: Not for nothin’, Bob, but those little compartments did look like cubes.
Bob: Oh, for God’s sake. Go take off the ridiculous outfit, will ya?
END OF INTERVIEW
The cubiclizing of people in modern corporations is monolithic insanity. (Robert Probst)
Bob died a broken man, shattered by the realization that the seeds he’d sown had reaped the cubicle farm.
According to his wife, “His only consolation was that no one ever called him Cubby.”
RIP, Bob. You did the best you could.
Originally Published on https://www.bizcatalyst360.com/category/lifecolumns/notes-to-self/
