Cubicle Survival Guide Keeping Your Cool in the Least Hospitable Environment on Earth

Chapter One Perspective Over the centuries humankind has adapted to all kinds of environments and climates. As our surroundings evolve, so do we. Eskimos adjusted to arctic conditions by building igloos and hunting in sealskin canoes. In Los Angeles, where the weather is perfect, people have decided they need to be perfect, too, and survive on green-tea hand lotion and Botox injections. For thirteen hundred years the residents of Inuyama, Japan, have provided for their families with ukai, a traditional style of river fishing that utilizes cormorants on leashes. Nevertheless, despite its impressive history, the human race has had difficulty harmonizing with the proliferation of cubicle environments. Some treat their cube like an Exxon bathroom; others, like a fabric chamber of corporate policy. Perhaps in the future the harsh cubicle landscape won't produce a homogenized corporate humankind, but an individualistic Australian-like wildlife of humanity, teeming with evolutionary freaks such as the platypus, koala bear, and saltwater crocodile. Yet to envision the future of cubicles, we must take a look at their history. Where did cubicles officially come from? And why? Cubicles were originally designed so that office workers could freely discuss and trade ideas without being tempted to shake hands or exchange pictures of their children. Every dimension of the cubicle partition has a specific, tactical purpose. Though invented back in the 1960s by Bob Probst, a professor of fine arts at the University of Colorado, cubicles became an unpopular cultural phenomenon in America around the same time actual money was replaced by the idea of stock options and entry-level twenty-somethings began renting limousines for no reason other than it was a Saturday night. Today those twenty-somethings drive SUVs, and the only fallout from the fusion-like implosion of the dot-com era is a nuclear winter of cubicle farms inhabited by lithe humans who toil in confined spaces in exchange for compensation. Despite sensitivity training, ergonomic keyboards, and much-needed health insurance that includes psychotherapy, cubicle dwellers can't escape the oppressive monotony and homogenization of their existences. Fear not, The Cubicle Survival Guide is here to help. Shhhh . . . They're Not Real Walls First, know your surroundings. Most cubicle dwellers have no idea what their walls are made of or why. Today most cubicles are relatively uniform and constructed from a one- or two-inch steel frame that supports a wood core wrapped in neutrally colored fabric so it can be utilized as a bulletin board. Many cubicles come with various accessory options such as shelves, cabinets, or over-desk storage. However, the characteristic that has made the cubicle omnipresent in capitalistic ventures across the planet is that it is, as one seller puts it, "Easy to assemble and move without tools." In other words, you can reconfigure how and where employees work within minutes. So don't get comfortable. The days of lifelong employment and company loyalty are long gone. Global and national economies are constantly ebbing and flowing, sometimes drastically, which means businesses are, too. They need the ability to adapt and reconfigure their mission statements, their corporate profiles, and, yes, their employee structure. Likewise, employees are often, even in their own cubicles, searching for the next step in their professional lives. Cubicles serve as the drab metaphor and stark, impersonal reality of the modern employee-employer relationship: Expendability rules. This is why one can earn an advanced degree in human resources. Considering America's long love affair with the right to privacy and individuality, it seems paradoxical that forty million of us voluntarily work in cubicles. The traditional American pioneer spirit seems at odds with the reality of our modern culture. So what happeThompson, James F. is the author of 'Cubicle Survival Guide Keeping Your Cool in the Least Hospitable Environment on Earth', published 2007 under ISBN 9780812976762 and ISBN 0812976762.