Numbered rooms in the workplace
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What are the disadvantages (if any) to having numbered rooms in an office?
Numbering rooms is obviously helpful as a way to navigate to a room and to unambiguously talk about a precise room.
Are there any disadvantages to numbering rooms? (These could be tangible, psychological, or social reasons, etc.)
work-environment offices office-layout
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up vote
6
down vote
favorite
What are the disadvantages (if any) to having numbered rooms in an office?
Numbering rooms is obviously helpful as a way to navigate to a room and to unambiguously talk about a precise room.
Are there any disadvantages to numbering rooms? (These could be tangible, psychological, or social reasons, etc.)
work-environment offices office-layout
add a comment |Â
up vote
6
down vote
favorite
up vote
6
down vote
favorite
What are the disadvantages (if any) to having numbered rooms in an office?
Numbering rooms is obviously helpful as a way to navigate to a room and to unambiguously talk about a precise room.
Are there any disadvantages to numbering rooms? (These could be tangible, psychological, or social reasons, etc.)
work-environment offices office-layout
What are the disadvantages (if any) to having numbered rooms in an office?
Numbering rooms is obviously helpful as a way to navigate to a room and to unambiguously talk about a precise room.
Are there any disadvantages to numbering rooms? (These could be tangible, psychological, or social reasons, etc.)
work-environment offices office-layout
asked Jul 6 '12 at 2:54


aaaidan
1374
1374
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3 Answers
3
active
oldest
votes
up vote
12
down vote
The question was disadvantages to numbering rooms.
There is one disadvantage I can think of: If the interior walls are expected to change, Or the number of employees is expected to grow a lot before the lease is up: Numbers can make the changes even more confusing.
I have seen companies turn a conference room into new offices. Now you could have the problem that conference room was #007, but now one of the new rooms will be 007 1/2 or 007A.
I have also seen closets turned into office space. If you forgot to number the closet, now you have to stuff two people into an unnumbered space, and describe it as the 2nd unnumbered door after #007.
Turning offices into conference rooms or senior mangers offices results in the need to skip a number.
All these changes result in confusion. Employees room numbers change without them moving, others refer to the space as "we are meeting in room which used to be #007 before Joe retired and they redid the floor when the new CEO was hired"
The advantages are many: navigation, logistics. These are so important once the lack of room identification it is time to develop a numbering or naming scheme.
Keep in mind that employees may start to name the rooms themselves. They will say "I see you were assigned Sean's old office, he was here long before Daniel"
5
number things, incrementing by 5. Thus, you'll almost always have room between them if needed.
– acolyte
Jul 6 '12 at 13:22
@acolyte - that kind of numbering may confuse visitors - people generally expect to see consecutively numbered rooms, if they don't see that they may wonder if they're missing something. Of course, if you don't expect many visitors unfamiliar with the building, it's not a problem, and even if you do, it's not that bad.
– weronika
Jul 7 '12 at 4:30
it keeps the rooms in each particular section increasing in order. this way, when they see room, say 405, they know room 420 is farther along. then they see rooms 410 and 415, either they realize the numbers go up by 5 or they're too stupid to take them seriously, in which case who cares if they're confused.
– acolyte
Jul 7 '12 at 19:39
1
I will say having a way to effectively communicate where someone/thing is located can help people feel less confused at the office. That in turn makes them feel more comfortable - typically a good thing. If the numbers have an order to give you the general location such as Blue Zone Cube 5. You at least know where to start looking. If something is just labeled the Rose Room, how does anyone know where to look. There are many ways to deal with this issue but it is important. Think about how unproductive people can be if they can't find someone they need to work with.
– Bradford Benn
Jul 14 '12 at 3:57
add a comment |Â
up vote
6
down vote
To start with, when there are many rooms in workplace, numbers are hard to beat - exactly for the reasons you mention. In cases like this, numbers provide the most convenient way to navigate to a room (one of a many others) and to unambiguously talk about a precise room.
Numbers are also quite handy for "bureaucratic" purposes, like eg tracking equipment / furniture location, movement and delivery.
When there are not that many rooms, or when there is small specific subset like conference rooms, it can make sense to give rooms non-numeric, "personalized" names. These are more fun and (when there are not many rooms) are easier to memorize. This appears to be quite a popular practice, just search the web for something like conference rooms names. 1, 2, 3, ...
- Note "personalized" names don't necessarily exclude an option to use room numbering in parallel. For "bureaucratic" purposes, boring numbers may be still more convenient, especially when there could be room renaming.
Room 42 has been recently renamed from "Alpha Centauri" to, well, "42"
add a comment |Â
up vote
1
down vote
Room numbers serve two purposes: they identify the physical location and provide cues to help people navigate to the room.
Modern "Class A" office space for a variety of reasons are usually configured as open plan or modular, so the navigational benefits of a number are less useful. If you are in an older building with a series of rooms, a numbering system makes sense.
add a comment |Â
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3 Answers
3
active
oldest
votes
3 Answers
3
active
oldest
votes
active
oldest
votes
active
oldest
votes
up vote
12
down vote
The question was disadvantages to numbering rooms.
There is one disadvantage I can think of: If the interior walls are expected to change, Or the number of employees is expected to grow a lot before the lease is up: Numbers can make the changes even more confusing.
I have seen companies turn a conference room into new offices. Now you could have the problem that conference room was #007, but now one of the new rooms will be 007 1/2 or 007A.
I have also seen closets turned into office space. If you forgot to number the closet, now you have to stuff two people into an unnumbered space, and describe it as the 2nd unnumbered door after #007.
Turning offices into conference rooms or senior mangers offices results in the need to skip a number.
All these changes result in confusion. Employees room numbers change without them moving, others refer to the space as "we are meeting in room which used to be #007 before Joe retired and they redid the floor when the new CEO was hired"
The advantages are many: navigation, logistics. These are so important once the lack of room identification it is time to develop a numbering or naming scheme.
Keep in mind that employees may start to name the rooms themselves. They will say "I see you were assigned Sean's old office, he was here long before Daniel"
5
number things, incrementing by 5. Thus, you'll almost always have room between them if needed.
– acolyte
Jul 6 '12 at 13:22
@acolyte - that kind of numbering may confuse visitors - people generally expect to see consecutively numbered rooms, if they don't see that they may wonder if they're missing something. Of course, if you don't expect many visitors unfamiliar with the building, it's not a problem, and even if you do, it's not that bad.
– weronika
Jul 7 '12 at 4:30
it keeps the rooms in each particular section increasing in order. this way, when they see room, say 405, they know room 420 is farther along. then they see rooms 410 and 415, either they realize the numbers go up by 5 or they're too stupid to take them seriously, in which case who cares if they're confused.
– acolyte
Jul 7 '12 at 19:39
1
I will say having a way to effectively communicate where someone/thing is located can help people feel less confused at the office. That in turn makes them feel more comfortable - typically a good thing. If the numbers have an order to give you the general location such as Blue Zone Cube 5. You at least know where to start looking. If something is just labeled the Rose Room, how does anyone know where to look. There are many ways to deal with this issue but it is important. Think about how unproductive people can be if they can't find someone they need to work with.
– Bradford Benn
Jul 14 '12 at 3:57
add a comment |Â
up vote
12
down vote
The question was disadvantages to numbering rooms.
There is one disadvantage I can think of: If the interior walls are expected to change, Or the number of employees is expected to grow a lot before the lease is up: Numbers can make the changes even more confusing.
I have seen companies turn a conference room into new offices. Now you could have the problem that conference room was #007, but now one of the new rooms will be 007 1/2 or 007A.
I have also seen closets turned into office space. If you forgot to number the closet, now you have to stuff two people into an unnumbered space, and describe it as the 2nd unnumbered door after #007.
Turning offices into conference rooms or senior mangers offices results in the need to skip a number.
All these changes result in confusion. Employees room numbers change without them moving, others refer to the space as "we are meeting in room which used to be #007 before Joe retired and they redid the floor when the new CEO was hired"
The advantages are many: navigation, logistics. These are so important once the lack of room identification it is time to develop a numbering or naming scheme.
Keep in mind that employees may start to name the rooms themselves. They will say "I see you were assigned Sean's old office, he was here long before Daniel"
5
number things, incrementing by 5. Thus, you'll almost always have room between them if needed.
– acolyte
Jul 6 '12 at 13:22
@acolyte - that kind of numbering may confuse visitors - people generally expect to see consecutively numbered rooms, if they don't see that they may wonder if they're missing something. Of course, if you don't expect many visitors unfamiliar with the building, it's not a problem, and even if you do, it's not that bad.
– weronika
Jul 7 '12 at 4:30
it keeps the rooms in each particular section increasing in order. this way, when they see room, say 405, they know room 420 is farther along. then they see rooms 410 and 415, either they realize the numbers go up by 5 or they're too stupid to take them seriously, in which case who cares if they're confused.
– acolyte
Jul 7 '12 at 19:39
1
I will say having a way to effectively communicate where someone/thing is located can help people feel less confused at the office. That in turn makes them feel more comfortable - typically a good thing. If the numbers have an order to give you the general location such as Blue Zone Cube 5. You at least know where to start looking. If something is just labeled the Rose Room, how does anyone know where to look. There are many ways to deal with this issue but it is important. Think about how unproductive people can be if they can't find someone they need to work with.
– Bradford Benn
Jul 14 '12 at 3:57
add a comment |Â
up vote
12
down vote
up vote
12
down vote
The question was disadvantages to numbering rooms.
There is one disadvantage I can think of: If the interior walls are expected to change, Or the number of employees is expected to grow a lot before the lease is up: Numbers can make the changes even more confusing.
I have seen companies turn a conference room into new offices. Now you could have the problem that conference room was #007, but now one of the new rooms will be 007 1/2 or 007A.
I have also seen closets turned into office space. If you forgot to number the closet, now you have to stuff two people into an unnumbered space, and describe it as the 2nd unnumbered door after #007.
Turning offices into conference rooms or senior mangers offices results in the need to skip a number.
All these changes result in confusion. Employees room numbers change without them moving, others refer to the space as "we are meeting in room which used to be #007 before Joe retired and they redid the floor when the new CEO was hired"
The advantages are many: navigation, logistics. These are so important once the lack of room identification it is time to develop a numbering or naming scheme.
Keep in mind that employees may start to name the rooms themselves. They will say "I see you were assigned Sean's old office, he was here long before Daniel"
The question was disadvantages to numbering rooms.
There is one disadvantage I can think of: If the interior walls are expected to change, Or the number of employees is expected to grow a lot before the lease is up: Numbers can make the changes even more confusing.
I have seen companies turn a conference room into new offices. Now you could have the problem that conference room was #007, but now one of the new rooms will be 007 1/2 or 007A.
I have also seen closets turned into office space. If you forgot to number the closet, now you have to stuff two people into an unnumbered space, and describe it as the 2nd unnumbered door after #007.
Turning offices into conference rooms or senior mangers offices results in the need to skip a number.
All these changes result in confusion. Employees room numbers change without them moving, others refer to the space as "we are meeting in room which used to be #007 before Joe retired and they redid the floor when the new CEO was hired"
The advantages are many: navigation, logistics. These are so important once the lack of room identification it is time to develop a numbering or naming scheme.
Keep in mind that employees may start to name the rooms themselves. They will say "I see you were assigned Sean's old office, he was here long before Daniel"
edited Jan 24 at 8:20


Snow♦
50.1k44166211
50.1k44166211
answered Jul 6 '12 at 11:08
mhoran_psprep
40.3k463144
40.3k463144
5
number things, incrementing by 5. Thus, you'll almost always have room between them if needed.
– acolyte
Jul 6 '12 at 13:22
@acolyte - that kind of numbering may confuse visitors - people generally expect to see consecutively numbered rooms, if they don't see that they may wonder if they're missing something. Of course, if you don't expect many visitors unfamiliar with the building, it's not a problem, and even if you do, it's not that bad.
– weronika
Jul 7 '12 at 4:30
it keeps the rooms in each particular section increasing in order. this way, when they see room, say 405, they know room 420 is farther along. then they see rooms 410 and 415, either they realize the numbers go up by 5 or they're too stupid to take them seriously, in which case who cares if they're confused.
– acolyte
Jul 7 '12 at 19:39
1
I will say having a way to effectively communicate where someone/thing is located can help people feel less confused at the office. That in turn makes them feel more comfortable - typically a good thing. If the numbers have an order to give you the general location such as Blue Zone Cube 5. You at least know where to start looking. If something is just labeled the Rose Room, how does anyone know where to look. There are many ways to deal with this issue but it is important. Think about how unproductive people can be if they can't find someone they need to work with.
– Bradford Benn
Jul 14 '12 at 3:57
add a comment |Â
5
number things, incrementing by 5. Thus, you'll almost always have room between them if needed.
– acolyte
Jul 6 '12 at 13:22
@acolyte - that kind of numbering may confuse visitors - people generally expect to see consecutively numbered rooms, if they don't see that they may wonder if they're missing something. Of course, if you don't expect many visitors unfamiliar with the building, it's not a problem, and even if you do, it's not that bad.
– weronika
Jul 7 '12 at 4:30
it keeps the rooms in each particular section increasing in order. this way, when they see room, say 405, they know room 420 is farther along. then they see rooms 410 and 415, either they realize the numbers go up by 5 or they're too stupid to take them seriously, in which case who cares if they're confused.
– acolyte
Jul 7 '12 at 19:39
1
I will say having a way to effectively communicate where someone/thing is located can help people feel less confused at the office. That in turn makes them feel more comfortable - typically a good thing. If the numbers have an order to give you the general location such as Blue Zone Cube 5. You at least know where to start looking. If something is just labeled the Rose Room, how does anyone know where to look. There are many ways to deal with this issue but it is important. Think about how unproductive people can be if they can't find someone they need to work with.
– Bradford Benn
Jul 14 '12 at 3:57
5
5
number things, incrementing by 5. Thus, you'll almost always have room between them if needed.
– acolyte
Jul 6 '12 at 13:22
number things, incrementing by 5. Thus, you'll almost always have room between them if needed.
– acolyte
Jul 6 '12 at 13:22
@acolyte - that kind of numbering may confuse visitors - people generally expect to see consecutively numbered rooms, if they don't see that they may wonder if they're missing something. Of course, if you don't expect many visitors unfamiliar with the building, it's not a problem, and even if you do, it's not that bad.
– weronika
Jul 7 '12 at 4:30
@acolyte - that kind of numbering may confuse visitors - people generally expect to see consecutively numbered rooms, if they don't see that they may wonder if they're missing something. Of course, if you don't expect many visitors unfamiliar with the building, it's not a problem, and even if you do, it's not that bad.
– weronika
Jul 7 '12 at 4:30
it keeps the rooms in each particular section increasing in order. this way, when they see room, say 405, they know room 420 is farther along. then they see rooms 410 and 415, either they realize the numbers go up by 5 or they're too stupid to take them seriously, in which case who cares if they're confused.
– acolyte
Jul 7 '12 at 19:39
it keeps the rooms in each particular section increasing in order. this way, when they see room, say 405, they know room 420 is farther along. then they see rooms 410 and 415, either they realize the numbers go up by 5 or they're too stupid to take them seriously, in which case who cares if they're confused.
– acolyte
Jul 7 '12 at 19:39
1
1
I will say having a way to effectively communicate where someone/thing is located can help people feel less confused at the office. That in turn makes them feel more comfortable - typically a good thing. If the numbers have an order to give you the general location such as Blue Zone Cube 5. You at least know where to start looking. If something is just labeled the Rose Room, how does anyone know where to look. There are many ways to deal with this issue but it is important. Think about how unproductive people can be if they can't find someone they need to work with.
– Bradford Benn
Jul 14 '12 at 3:57
I will say having a way to effectively communicate where someone/thing is located can help people feel less confused at the office. That in turn makes them feel more comfortable - typically a good thing. If the numbers have an order to give you the general location such as Blue Zone Cube 5. You at least know where to start looking. If something is just labeled the Rose Room, how does anyone know where to look. There are many ways to deal with this issue but it is important. Think about how unproductive people can be if they can't find someone they need to work with.
– Bradford Benn
Jul 14 '12 at 3:57
add a comment |Â
up vote
6
down vote
To start with, when there are many rooms in workplace, numbers are hard to beat - exactly for the reasons you mention. In cases like this, numbers provide the most convenient way to navigate to a room (one of a many others) and to unambiguously talk about a precise room.
Numbers are also quite handy for "bureaucratic" purposes, like eg tracking equipment / furniture location, movement and delivery.
When there are not that many rooms, or when there is small specific subset like conference rooms, it can make sense to give rooms non-numeric, "personalized" names. These are more fun and (when there are not many rooms) are easier to memorize. This appears to be quite a popular practice, just search the web for something like conference rooms names. 1, 2, 3, ...
- Note "personalized" names don't necessarily exclude an option to use room numbering in parallel. For "bureaucratic" purposes, boring numbers may be still more convenient, especially when there could be room renaming.
Room 42 has been recently renamed from "Alpha Centauri" to, well, "42"
add a comment |Â
up vote
6
down vote
To start with, when there are many rooms in workplace, numbers are hard to beat - exactly for the reasons you mention. In cases like this, numbers provide the most convenient way to navigate to a room (one of a many others) and to unambiguously talk about a precise room.
Numbers are also quite handy for "bureaucratic" purposes, like eg tracking equipment / furniture location, movement and delivery.
When there are not that many rooms, or when there is small specific subset like conference rooms, it can make sense to give rooms non-numeric, "personalized" names. These are more fun and (when there are not many rooms) are easier to memorize. This appears to be quite a popular practice, just search the web for something like conference rooms names. 1, 2, 3, ...
- Note "personalized" names don't necessarily exclude an option to use room numbering in parallel. For "bureaucratic" purposes, boring numbers may be still more convenient, especially when there could be room renaming.
Room 42 has been recently renamed from "Alpha Centauri" to, well, "42"
add a comment |Â
up vote
6
down vote
up vote
6
down vote
To start with, when there are many rooms in workplace, numbers are hard to beat - exactly for the reasons you mention. In cases like this, numbers provide the most convenient way to navigate to a room (one of a many others) and to unambiguously talk about a precise room.
Numbers are also quite handy for "bureaucratic" purposes, like eg tracking equipment / furniture location, movement and delivery.
When there are not that many rooms, or when there is small specific subset like conference rooms, it can make sense to give rooms non-numeric, "personalized" names. These are more fun and (when there are not many rooms) are easier to memorize. This appears to be quite a popular practice, just search the web for something like conference rooms names. 1, 2, 3, ...
- Note "personalized" names don't necessarily exclude an option to use room numbering in parallel. For "bureaucratic" purposes, boring numbers may be still more convenient, especially when there could be room renaming.
Room 42 has been recently renamed from "Alpha Centauri" to, well, "42"
To start with, when there are many rooms in workplace, numbers are hard to beat - exactly for the reasons you mention. In cases like this, numbers provide the most convenient way to navigate to a room (one of a many others) and to unambiguously talk about a precise room.
Numbers are also quite handy for "bureaucratic" purposes, like eg tracking equipment / furniture location, movement and delivery.
When there are not that many rooms, or when there is small specific subset like conference rooms, it can make sense to give rooms non-numeric, "personalized" names. These are more fun and (when there are not many rooms) are easier to memorize. This appears to be quite a popular practice, just search the web for something like conference rooms names. 1, 2, 3, ...
- Note "personalized" names don't necessarily exclude an option to use room numbering in parallel. For "bureaucratic" purposes, boring numbers may be still more convenient, especially when there could be room renaming.
Room 42 has been recently renamed from "Alpha Centauri" to, well, "42"
answered Jul 6 '12 at 10:25
gnat
3,23273066
3,23273066
add a comment |Â
add a comment |Â
up vote
1
down vote
Room numbers serve two purposes: they identify the physical location and provide cues to help people navigate to the room.
Modern "Class A" office space for a variety of reasons are usually configured as open plan or modular, so the navigational benefits of a number are less useful. If you are in an older building with a series of rooms, a numbering system makes sense.
add a comment |Â
up vote
1
down vote
Room numbers serve two purposes: they identify the physical location and provide cues to help people navigate to the room.
Modern "Class A" office space for a variety of reasons are usually configured as open plan or modular, so the navigational benefits of a number are less useful. If you are in an older building with a series of rooms, a numbering system makes sense.
add a comment |Â
up vote
1
down vote
up vote
1
down vote
Room numbers serve two purposes: they identify the physical location and provide cues to help people navigate to the room.
Modern "Class A" office space for a variety of reasons are usually configured as open plan or modular, so the navigational benefits of a number are less useful. If you are in an older building with a series of rooms, a numbering system makes sense.
Room numbers serve two purposes: they identify the physical location and provide cues to help people navigate to the room.
Modern "Class A" office space for a variety of reasons are usually configured as open plan or modular, so the navigational benefits of a number are less useful. If you are in an older building with a series of rooms, a numbering system makes sense.
answered Jul 10 '12 at 14:22
duffbeer703
1112
1112
add a comment |Â
add a comment |Â
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