I read this article about how millennials aren’t buying as many cars and houses. Down toward the end of the article, they had this interesting bit:
“Our wealth, after all, is determined not only by our own skills and talents, but by our ability to access the ideas of those around us; there’s a lot to be gained by increasing the odds that smart people might bump against each other.”
This sounded familiar… oh, right. I had read something like this before about Pixar:
The biography adds that Jobs believed that, “If a building doesn’t encourage [collaboration], you’ll lose a lot of innovation and the magic that’s sparked by serendipity. So we designed the building to make people get out of their offices and mingle in the central atrium with people they might not otherwise see.”
Well, well, well. Collaboration! Through random meetings and bumping into people. Networking at your own company, so to speak. Now thinking about this as someone who stutters, I think, well, that ain’t gonna work for me! For all the jobs I’ve had so far, they’ve been in more “traditional” offices. Cubicles, closed offices, no centralized meeting space. For any office meetings, they’d been with people I had been introduced to. I worked at one client site that had several buildings connected together through large hallways, but I never bothered introducing myself to people I ran into.
So would an open office work for me? If I worked in one, what would I do? Would I just “bump into people” and introduce myself or start talking to them? How terrifying is that?
I think at first I … wouldn’t. I’d just keep my head down and keep walking. I’d have to make a lot of repeated eye contact or share a hello or see them doing something that I could talk to them about (maybe comment on their bicycle or car if saw them come in).
Then I might try to tag along with someone else who’s more social. I know I’ve said I’d try to be more open about my stuttering, but jumping into a large non-stuttering crowd (unlike the NSA Conference, say) is pretty scary.
The more I think about it, it seems that what might happen is … a quick conversation. Just as desired. But it’d move along quickly. And no introductions would happen. Then a few days later, something would be added. And then the stress would continue to mount. Because short conversations probably equal little to no stuttering, but as they continue, the desire to introduce myself would get stronger — and the inevitable question from them.
See how this stuttering works? Elaborate scenarios! Then just shutting it all down.
Hello. I stutter. 