Timeline for How to let colleagues know that your desk is vacant?
Current License: CC BY-SA 4.0
12 events
| when toggle format | what | by | license | comment | |
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| Apr 24, 2020 at 12:24 | comment | added | simon | @Justin In my experience if somebody leaves the desk for a short period of time he always leaves something personally identifiable on the desk, mostly a laptop, smart phone or similar. I think an 1-hour hourglass would be a better solution here (idea got and modified from the comment in the original question), if an external "flag" is really necessary. | |
| Apr 24, 2020 at 10:29 | comment | added | Justin | @simon - Because the desk may be in use without being physically occupied for brief periods. Examples: Go make a cup of tea and spend 5 minutes chatting to a co worker; Attend a stand-up (15 minutes or so) elsewhere; Go to lunch. It's annoying and slightly embarrassing for all parties on returning to your allocated desk to find some roaming sales person has plugged in and now refuses to leave. | |
| Apr 23, 2020 at 8:21 | comment | added | simon | I don't see any informational value in the flag. As described, the flag corresponds to the person being there, so the person himself is already the flag, so-to-speak. | |
| Jan 23, 2020 at 22:40 | comment | added | Doktor J | @MechMK1 My less-completely-over-engineered solution would be to make little ATTiny-based devices; upon power-on, the ATTiny illuminates a green LED indicating a free desk. When someone sits at the desk, they press a button on the device, starting a 12 hour countdown -- the LED is turned off, to be re-illuminated after the countdown expires. If desired, have a second button for long-term occupancy: press once to indicate occupied, press again to indicate vacancy. | |
| Jan 23, 2020 at 9:54 | comment | added | MechMK1 | I want to create a completely over-engineered solution where employee phones use NFC to automatically tell when a user last used which desk and to see which desks are "reserved" and vacant, just because I love over-engineering solutions to the point of absurdity. | |
| Jan 23, 2020 at 0:56 | history | edited | Basil Bourque | CC BY-SA 4.0 |
Reworded a bit for clarity about my point being a sign-per-desk rather literally a flag. Comments suggested some readers were not clear.
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| Jan 22, 2020 at 14:33 | comment | added | UKMonkey | I think the primary point of this answer isn't the standing flag, but that the status stays with the desk. A card that has "free for hot desking" (and maybe coloured green) on one side and "unavailable" (coloured red) on the other would do just fine; but now you have the ability to see the state of any desk at a glance; and can change it without effort. | |
| Jan 22, 2020 at 12:35 | comment | added | KlaymenDK | This is common in many marinas -- every berth has a red sign; when you're going on an extended cruise you flip it to green (and possibly write your expected return date with a grease pen). Simple, effective. | |
| Jan 22, 2020 at 10:31 | comment | added | Alexander | That's why digital desk-sharing solutions can "raise the flag" automatically during the night. You go to a desk, press a key to "check in", and if configured that way, the status is reset to "free" at some point during the night. | |
| Jan 22, 2020 at 8:58 | comment | added | Tom Bowen | @Mast just have a box of a few flags for the floor and you grab one to put up. Or do you mean forgetting to put it up? In that case nothing will ever work if you are just going to forget. | |
| Jan 22, 2020 at 7:42 | comment | added | Mast | What about forgetting the flag? | |
| Jan 21, 2020 at 22:33 | history | answered | Basil Bourque | CC BY-SA 4.0 |