>One of my coworkers was really insistent on me going, so I finally snapped, “$NAME, I’ll go if you’ll push my wheelchair the whole day!” This was Very Awkward, but IMO I was just surfacing the existing awkwardness: my very well-meaning coworker was already making it awkward by not believing me about my own abilities. Sometimes a Bad Joke can snap people into realizing what they’re doing.
I would be totally down to push a coworker in a wheelchair if they really did want to go and this was the only thing preventing them from joining us. Like my response to that woulda been "sure"
That one resonated a lot. It looks to me like in a lot of micromanaged places people need to over-explain why they need to Work From Home or leave early or take a sick day. I have struggled with that also but for the last couple of months I have decided to state the fact without any justification. For example "I will leave at 2PM today" or "I'm taking a sick day today".
If you (over)justify yourself it sounds like you don't have a good enough reason to start with. And on top of that I'm an adult and don't need to justify myself for those type of things.
Very thoughtful author. I would like to get her thoughts on where a employeer should draw the line on staying that a disability cannot be accommodated. For example, someone who had a light sensitivity as well as PTSD may need to work in a dark quiet environment. How far does the company go to support that need?
In the USA, a company had best make as much accommodation as necessary for the specific illness/disability/challenge - no one wants the legal headaches associated with failing to give accommodation under ADA. That means providing a diagnosis to HR (or your equivalent) and discussing what's appropriate. If there's pushback from HR, and the employee feels they require certain accommodation, a note from the doctor works wonders.
In the US, the ADA says accommodations must be "reasonable." - what's "reasonable" is sometimes up for debate
So it's unreasonable for a grocery store employee to get a quite dark working environment because of the nature of grocery stores.
If the physical office couldn't reasonably accommodate a quite dark area, then maybe a partial work from home would work for that employee, as long as the work they were doing didn't require a physical presence. Or sunglasses and earplugs.
Well. Using headphones all day damages our hearing... We work better without constant distractions. We are pretty expensive to employ and then use at 50% potential.
Headphones do not inherently damage hearing. What's damaging, is listening to them at a high volume. This might occur if you're in a noisy environment, and use headphones with poor isolation, e.g. airpods, which need to overpower the ambient noise.
You can absolutely listen to headphones all day, in a quiet environment or if they provide good isolation.
Right, it's not dangerous to your hearing at appropriate levels. Although as any audio engineer will tell you, having the sound source that close to your ears for a long time can be a bit psychologically tiring. It's still best to take a break every so often.
1. Does using headphones damage our hearing? I am aware that using certain kinds of open earphones are associated with hearing loss but my understanding was that this had more to do with how high the volume needs to be to drown out the noise. Proper IEMs and noise cancelling headphones should definitely not suffer from that issue.
2. 50% potential is a bold claim, but even if that were true it may still be economically wise to stick with the 50% penalty considering how expensive it would be to have a large number of employees with their own offices.
Sometimes my day is wasted if I am working on a hard problem and I am at 75% mentally. Sometimes I am net negative (committing major bugs) and I would have been wiser to do something else entirely. If every day I am not at full capacity, there are entire problems I would therefore be wiser to leave alone. Productivity, at the detail level, is not a smooth curve.
I'll also point out that the folks advocating for "collaborative" offices generally make "bold claims" with little evidence (or even argument, at times) to substantiate.
I do not think open-plan offices are good, I hate them. But, they have such an economical advantage that I'm not really surprised the trend continues despite the fact that everyone hates them. I think the real answer is that even a pretty enormous productivity drop will end up being worth it if you only care about the economics.
The point is that this is not a well substantiated position. Even if it is clearly demonstrated in some anecdotal cases (sales, marketing, tech support), there is a wide variation in what the day-to-day looks like within software development organizations. Keeping in mind, especially, that an open workspace for a small shop of 10 engineers is completely different than an open workspace for a floor of 200 engineers. And even moreso if there is a mixture of engineering and non-engineering (management, client relations, sales, etc.) on the same floor.
There are enough ins and outs in how work actually gets done that I'm skeptical that we can categorically say much about open floor plans. I'm sure they are more efficient in many cases. I'm certainly not granting the implied "always" or "often enough to be granted" in "they have such an economical advantage".
My default take for such things is that companies should be hiring experts and then trusting their expert opinions. Otherwise, I'm not sure what's the purpose of spending millions on presumably wise and intelligent engineers.
No. You're going to have to expand on that. Active noise cancelling means there is less sound reaching your ears. It works by -- quite literally -- cancelling the sound waves.
You do not know of what you speak. It does not add sound pressure. Reducing sound pressure is the physical mechanism by which it operates. The inverse sound means that both sounds literally no longer exist.
> prevent your perception of sound.
No. It is destructively interfering with the wave. You don't perceive it because there is no more sound, not because of some perceptual trick.
(For any pedants looking on, I'm ignoring the fact that the cancellation may be imperfect. Unless there's actually constructive interference going on -- which is not what delinka is saying -- there is plain and simply less sound.)
Of course it will affect air pressure, but in theory it should be literally cancelling the sound waves. All the literature I can find at a cursory glance suggests ANC headphones are better for your hearing.
ANC isn’t perfect. ANC leaves a noticeable low level of noise from imperfect sensing, processing, and cancellation. It’s quite easy to imagine that this could be detrimental (as compared to passive noise canceling).
It’s probably not as good for your hearing as an equivalent level of passive NR. When I fly long trips, I notice that my hearing is slightly impaired for a day or so. There could be a lot of confounding factors there, of course.
Get a pair of musician's earplugs. They're wonderful. You can layer them with closed back headphones to get very robust silent isolation at a reasonable price.
You can also get ear pieces molded by an audiologist for some high end earbuds that will block out sound almost completely even if you're not playing any sound.
Wearing earplugs over long periods of time can give you nasty ear infections that are near-impossible to get rid of. Note: they are suggested not because of necessity, a noisy plant for example, they are suggested because of a management fad. Open offices are a choice, the noise level in a steelworking plant is not.
I am aware. Take out your earplugs when you take the 5-10 minute break you should be taking regularly throughout the day anyway because sitting and staring at a screen for long periods of time is also deleterious to your health :shrug:.
If I worked there and did not receive similar home office treatment I would leave...
Edit
I would do so quietly without making a fuss about it. You would probably not even realise that was the reason for me leaving. Basically if I see the rules of my workplace as unfair and arbitrary I will leave.
What's unfair and arbitrary is that some people are dealt disabilities. Net reduction of suffering is a good thing. You don't need to inflict yourself with jealousy over it.
How is it jealousy? I believe it's a fair point. If WFH is possible to help somebody deal with their illness, why isn't it an option for everybody? Clearly the team/company can make it work, so why not open the option for everyone?
It's like the whole "will consider remote for the right candidate" in job description. So everybody in the office is not the right candidate?
Is that the best approach, though? You might not be the only one who feels like the practices are harmful, and by speaking up could help the people around you.
You can also just leave without quitting. Tell your manager that you are unable to work in the current workspace, and walk out the door no matter what time it is. If you still get your work done and your co-workers catch on, you can help to improve the culture without needing to stick around in unreasonable conditions.
Management might not be thrilled, but if your plan was to quit anyways and you are professional and honest, where's the harm?
Maybe I didn't convey my point well enough - I meant that if you find your workplace to be too distracting/unaccommodating/etc, then you can tell your manager that it doesn't work for you and leave to do your work somewhere else or some other time. There's no third party besides the people who might also be annoyed by your workplace's dysfunction but don't want to say anything about it.
But besides, "person who cant work in our office due to sickness or disability gets to have more home-office time and position suitable for that" is not arbitrary rule at all.
Whether it is unfair can be debatable, but I would not see accomodation for someone sick as unfair to healthy me. I would also see it as good sight that if I get sick or need adjustment to some own situation, I get accommodation too.
"I am pointing out that treating people differently damages teams."
Not really. Sing happy birthday quickly during a meeting for folks that enjoy it. Skip over for the folks that would really rather one didn't. Adjusting for a sickness or disability isn't any different.
Most of the time, it boils down to things like giving the person with crutches a little extra time to use the toilet because it takes more time. I don't really understand why this would be an issue for you since, if you had crutches, you'd be treated similarly.
The same as if you developed migraines and were able to work from home a few days a month. More often, however, migraines are likely to be covered by FMLA (in the us) and the person gets time off for a certain amount of days.
If you truly think this stuff is unfair, I urge you to talk to your elected officials and complain about non-able bodied folks getting some special treatment and I truly hope you don't become disabled in any way afterwards.
> More often, however, migraines are likely to be covered by FMLA (in the us) and the person gets time off for a certain amount of days.
Almost always, you will be expected (rightly or wrongly) to use your PTO/sick days first (if you have any). Then FMLA may kick in (up to 12 weeks within a 12 month period), subject to several potential restrictions (e.g. employer company minimum size, employee tenure minimum, etc.) Also, the law states that your employer no longer has to pay you, they just have to keep your position available for you upon your return.
So, maybe that's no so great or useful and it's better for your employer to just deal with the fact that you get periodic migraines.
(Not disagreeing with your points, but wanted to clarify that FMLA is great for some situations but not all). People just need to be more understanding and compassionate.
> Most of the time, it boils down to things like giving the person with crutches a little extra time to use the toilet because it takes more time. I don't really understand why this would be an issue for you since, if you had crutches, you'd be treated similarly.
I am confused. Where did I say that would be a problem? I am very very OK with reasonable adjustments.
Sick leave is something I expect from a non broken society as well.
I object to unreasonable adjustments.
Edit
Oh and if my employer times us on the toilet I am definitely looking for another job!
> We're talking about an employer making reasonable accommodations for an employee with a disability.
Are we? Either attendance at the office is vital to the job or isn't. If you treat different members of your team differently you will annoy them, damage morale and damage your team.
> Maternity leave is another instance.
If your paternity leave isn't comparable to your maternity leave that's not OK.
> Either attendance at the office is vital to the job or isn't.
Not so. There's value to team cohesion in having a team physically together, but it's not outright fatal to permit remote working. That's why it's a reasonable accommodation.
> If you treat different members of your team differently you will annoy them, damage morale and damage your team.
I don't think so. Would you get resentful if a colleague took maternity leave?
I can't imagine a colleague reacting negatively to a clearly reasonable accommodation for a disability.
> If your paternity leave isn't comparable to your maternity leave that's not OK.
I'm not sure that's relevant, but sure, equal paternity leave isn't a bad idea.
> I don't think so. Would you get resentful if a colleague took maternity leave?
Of course not. Parental leave is offered to all employees right?
> I can't imagine a colleague reacting negatively to a clearly reasonable accommodation for a disability.
Nor could I. A clearly unreasonable one is not quite the same as a reasonable one is it?
> Not so. There's value to team cohesion in having a team physically together, but it's not outright fatal to permit remote working. That's why it's a reasonable accommodation.
We disagree. That is fine. But I doubt either of us will pursuade the other here so let's just leave this argument.
There’s another point of view that says “if it’s workable for person D who happens to have a disability, it is likely also workable for persons A-C and E-Z.”
There's value to team cohesion in having a team physically together. It won't be fatal to make an exception, and indeed it's possible run a company purely on remote working, but the point stands.
The thing about being able to have remote workers is that it works best when the company culture works in a way where everyone could be remote
In fact, now a disabled person is going to likely be excluded from the team because they're working remotely. How do you include them? By making everyone remote. That way people don't rely on a culture where documentation is interrupting someone at their desk (ps they won't respond on Slack or what have you, because if you really need to ask them something, just come by & interrupt them at their desk)
So now in order to accommodate someone you have to change the work environment for everyone
If it’s not fatal to make an exception for one person, is it fatal to make an exception for two? If it is, does that mean a team with one remote working exception can’t take on another? Does that fall afoul of reasonable accommodation rules? If so, what do they do? Is the accommodation that was previously workable (and therefore reasonable) now no longer workable?
I get your point, but I probably don’t think it’s quite as strong as you might think.
> I get your point, but I probably don’t think it’s quite as strong as you might think.
Sure it is. There isn't any real question of the sky falling down here.
Plenty of countries have strong laws protecting the rights of disabled employees, and it hasn't ruined their economies.
It's not that hard to insist on reasonable accommodations depending on circumstance. It's not like we force the fire service to hire people who don't have the use of their legs.
> There's value to team cohesion in having a team physically together. It won't be fatal to make an exception, and indeed it's possible run a company purely on remote working, but the point stands.
Citation? I've worked partially remote, fully remote, entirely in open officers, and entirely in a private office. Remote has been the best by far, both all around and for the healthiest team relationships IME.
This example seems a little tricky, because it involves remote work, which many people prefer, and which some organizations successfully offer to everyone.
If the accommodation were instead something that was desirable to you, but (unlike a remote work option) not something that would be viable to offer to everyone, would you still feel it's unfair?
And what if the company were legally precluded from offering you more money to compensate for not being able to provide the same thing to you?
Would you still feel the accommodation is unfair of the company, and want to leave the company?
Or would you see it as something the organization is collectively happy to do, to be inclusive and supportive of your fellow people? Or as something you understand the organization legally has to do, and you don't resent the organization for it?
(BTW, I think we might agree that some accommodations are actually things that probably can and should be offered to everyone. But I'm asking a hypothetical of a different situation, to understand better.)
(I appreciate your comment about accommodations that should be offered to everyone, and for which it turned out one time you too needed but did not get in time. That's upsetting and should not have happened. And I understand your skepticism of when a company says something isn't possible.)
But for the hypothetical, in an HN discussion, of when it's truly not possible to offer the thing to everyone... you can't answer because maybe(?) there's some other variables involved, and/or there's an emotional component?
For example, maybe there's some additional pertinent variables besides the hypothetical as I framed it, and you suspect there are some situations in which you could logically acknowledge that the organization has no other legal option, but you would still emotionally resent the organization/situation/environment, and leave because of that?
That seems a valid way to help figure out the full nature of how people in an organization feel about things (identify hidden contributing factors), but I'm going to need to apply for research funding at this point. :)
That's why it is difficult to answer. But giving one person something that you tell the rest of the team would make them less valuable is clearly not OK.
I think the idealistic idea is that it's a bit of "to each, according to their needs" -- people happy to support each other's needs. Though there are also less-idealistic reasons organizations do it, and why the laws had to be made.
The most ideal would be that most all the desirable things (work from home, quiet office, standing desk, good chair, flexible hours, etc.) would be offered to everyone, and then there's no special accommodation needed in most cases -- because everyone has those options to use at their discretion. It would also be more considerate of those who need something rather than prefer it -- don't make them ask, don't make them have to talk about something they might not want to talk about, don't single them out.
I'm lucky to not need any special accommodation now, but I'd value an environment that gave me those options, and I'd appreciate how respectful and supportive that is of everyone.
In any case, I'm glad that at least people who know they need special accommodation can often get it, thanks to laws. I just wish they and others usually didn't have to even mention it.
If the company wants employment to be a success, rather than a temporary period of grudging extraction of value through pain, then they have to go as far as is necessary to accommodate the employee.
The details will be different for every case, but generous work from home rules can help a lot.
Why? It's not self-evident that as far as is necessary is the correct answer here. If the costs are far outstripping the value delivered by the employee, then at the very least it's become a question of disabled rights, and not a business decision.
There's clearly a limit to the reasonable accommodations we can expect of an employer.
> If the company wants employment to be a success, rather than a temporary period of grudging extraction of value through pain
As far as I can tell, most major employers operate like grudging extraction of value is their definition of success. Then well-meaning managers at smaller companies implement "standard practice" and are baffled when it causes problems.
Great post! The general point of „being honest with yourself and the people around you“ is something much more people should take to heart, regardless of any existing medical conditions. It makes life so much easier and once you have a clearly defined problem you can start working on an effective solution. It all comes down to software engineering, really ;)
I don't need accomodations at work, personally. However, I am a big advocate for making sure that the people who do feel included. Maybe it's because I'm a minority in other ways.
I interviewed at a very large company and it was very nice when the recruiter asked me directly if I need accomodations for the interview. That's the good thing about large companies, they tend to put much more thought into that sort of thing.
Sounds to me this woman would benefit from one of those walkers with a built in seat. They have built in storage which would accomodate a laptop and there would always be a seat.
> I don't need accomodations at work, personally. However, I am a big advocate for making sure
Yeah, this post reminded me of the adage about programming for accessibility: the need for assistance doesn't even need to be permanent; we're all "disabled", or going to be, at some point, and in different ways and degrees.
Having a culture of normality around people adjusting their environment as needed benefits everyone. (Including the business, in the end!)
I did like this article a lot. I recently acquired asthma out of the blue and struggled a lot with asking people to accomodate. Need vs Request is especially hard. I’ve had breathing issues when we changed the office building but real estate said it’s too expensive to call in cleaners out of their usual once-a-year schedule, even when my manager chimed in. I was afraid to escalate past that because I didn’t want to be a hassle. As a result I had to suffer through it for 6 months before I changed teams and moved buildings. Looking back on it I should’ve made a statement and stuck with it because the 6 months of wheezing and subpar work because I was constantly suffering wasn’t worth it to me or my company.
I really liked this article. A lot of the things mentioned seem to be necessary because the author has “passing privilege”, but some are necessary due to poor management practices. Stand ups and in person meetings are two spots where this frequently happens.
I’ve inherited teams where everyone needs to stand during standup, or worse, where they do the push-up/plank thing if you want to speak. It shouldn’t take a great manager to realize these actions are exclusionary and have nothing to do with their job. Yes, I've gotten pushback from teams when I've told them to stop doing it during "their standup", but that's something we need to do as leaders.
Likewise for meetings, if you’re holding a meeting and people are standing or sitting on the floor, ask yourself, why are they there, how should they participate, and what should they take out of a meeting. It’s unlikely they’ll be able to meet those goals in the physical space you’ve secured. As the person running the meeting, it's your job to change the location rather than drumming on because it two weeks to schedule the meeting.
Great managers think about these things ahead of time rather than setting up exclusionary environments.
In such a software development organization, at the end of each meeting, everyone immediately has a moment of mindfulness, then pops another pill, shotguns a Red Bull, crushes the empty can on their forehead, shouts "Yo! Bro!", and crashes through the loft meeting room window, down to the open-plan work tables below.
If you want to make a culture fit, you have to break a few eggs.
It's been some time since I was 22, but I am fairly certain a number of 22 year old men would find this practice to be bullshit.
Though I do agree that people will tolerate more stupid things from their employer when they are younger. If they are at such a transitional phase of life and people that surround them demonstrate that something is normal, it will be easier to accept.
What would the workplace resemble if they were hiring 22 year old females? Can you give an answer with a straight face that doesn't patronize 50+% of the world population?
Well, like 22 year old men have certain tendencies that will prevail (e.g. a bro office culture), the same way a company of 22 year old females will have other tendencies that will prevail.
People not understanding statistics doesn't mean there are not some dominant traits in each group, even if they are not shared by all members of the group -- nor that it is patronizing to mention them (as if someone making a general statement about a group outcome is patronizing if they don't describe exactly what each and every individual involved in that group would be like and do).
>the same way a company of 22 year old females will have other tendencies that will prevail.
... Such as?
Btw, the issue isn't really "the tendencies 22 year old men" so much as it is people hiring for friends and drinking buddies instead of hiring for employees and colleagues
For one, a less competitive/macho culture, less booze friendly, less nerf guns, less nerdy references, -- on the other hand more agreeable collaboration, more petty antagonisms, etc.
Those are from empirical experiences working in a few XX and XY heavy environments.
But psychologists and social scientists have also long studied group dynamics in mens vs womens teams...
>Btw, the issue isn't really "the tendencies 22 year old men" so much as it is people hiring for friends and drinking buddies instead of hiring for employees and colleagues
Sure, but in startups and smaller companies in particular people also hire to match their idea of cool lifestyle, not just seeking employees and colleagues to maximize professional performance...
(Heck, they might even think that professional performance is secondary, and a 10x programmer that doesn't fit the culture will bring everybody down)
> psychologists and social scientists have also long studied group dynamics in mens vs womens teams...
If we are going down the researched stereotypical road, a group of 22 year old women has have more bullying, more social conflict, isolation tactics, and passive aggressiveness.
But do we really need to define group traits by gender if one is a few percent higher in competitiveness, other in bullying, and third in what kind of team building exercise that management think is suitable for their team? It all sound very stereotypical way of thinking about hiring procedures.
If we take a quick look at Sweden, there is this government department called Swedish Public Employment Service. A company sends in a list of requirements and they help to pick out suitable applicants. Seems like a good solution to the lifestyle hiring problem.
I think its a legitimate criticism of reductive statements against an arbitrarily selected group of people.
It's an effective strategy to point out "don't say this about this selection of people if you aren't willing to start saying similarly about its opposite."
I.e. one might not realize a blanket statement about the habits of 22 year old men is incorrect/untenable until someone points asks one to do the same for women, at which case for whatever reason cultural training or mechanisms for avoiding prejudice kick in.
I don't see someone trying to be offended - I see someone challenging a baseless assumption about an arbitrarily defined group of humans. No matter how you draw those lines in your selection criteria, you're going to get it wrong for a not-insignificant group of that selection, so why bother? Just don't make such blanket statements.
>No matter how you draw those lines in your selection criteria, you're going to get it wrong for a not-insignificant group of that selection, so why bother?
Because group dynamics are not about getting it right for any member of a group -- in fact you can get predictions wrong for all members of the group and still be right in their overall behavior.
You can "get it wrong for a not-insignificant group of that selection" and still be right for the overall group behavior.
Likewise, you can get lifestyle/beliefs/etc wrong for "a not-insignificant group" of people in the bible belt, but you can still make accurate statements with predictive power for the area as a whole...
As a man I don't feel patronized by that comment and the women I know aren't so fragile as to need to believe women can't be criticized. Why manufacture outrage if you don't have to?
I'm not sure op is manufacturing outrage. I'm not outraged but I am mildly annoyed that someone would assume me and my buddies would turn an office into barracks because that's "just what young men do."
More likely we'd turn it into the ultimate LAN party environment or something.
Your position patronizes young adults. Most 22 year olds, regardless of gender, would not accept this unless their job depending on it, in which case it’s your employer abusing you.
You should work with more 22 year olds, they are actually adults, you know...?
You have to plank while speaking, in order to motivate people to speak succinctly. Obviously disadvantages people who aren’t physically fit as they literally don’t get to contribute as much!
Everyone stands around in a circle and one person drops down on the floor in a plank to talk?
Maybe it's just me but I'd have a hard time taking this seriously.
Actually I found a more recent tweet depicting the actual practice, which has since been deleted. For the record, it was the same photo that appears in https://medium.com/@william.liu/daily-plank-meeting-732456e6... , a post that advises (!) this practice.
> Obviously disadvantages people who aren’t physically fit as they literally don’t get to contribute as much!
If I am quiet in a meeting when I have a contribution to make--and make no mistake, I'm not speaking up regardless of my fitness level--my employer suffers, not me. He suffers again when his messed up culture inevitably causes me to find another employer.
It's a sort of exercise where you hold yourself in a position as though you're going to do a push up, so supporting your body weight on your feet and either hands or your forearms while suspending your body a few inches off the floor. The aim is to just hold this position for as long as you can, normally.
The plank exercise is very similar to a pushup exercise move. It comes from making your body straight as a board (plank of wood). The position is face-down on the ground, with all of your weight supported by your toes and forearms.
It is generally difficult to hold that position in proper form for long periods of time (or at least your muscles start to ache)
> they do the push-up/plank thing if you want to speak
It never ceases to amaze me that businesses do this kind of thing (and many more besides) and still succeed. The induced drag from from stupid management practices is not that different from using crappy technology.
I don’t want to act like other groups are shining examples of competence and sanity, but after moving back to graduate school and technology type stuff (after working as a programmer in an accounting group) I was astounded by the sheer amount of insanity/mental illness in these apparently successful people. Plenty of manipulative narcissists in accounting but I never saw someone start ranting about the Jews and then start sprinting around the office and try to fight people about Postgres vs. MySQL
I want to play the devil's advocate here, but one motivation for meetings generally, is a memory, in some managers head, of a three million dollar disaster that occured strictly because some trivial piece of understanding had not passed from one group to another. It was a piece of knowledge that the first team considered so obvious that it didn't even bear stating. But the second team had no idea.
"Jim", the CEO said to the manager after that incident, "you're a good person, so we want you to stay here. But if we lose another seven figures because the right hand doesn't know what the left hand is doing on your staff again, it's over."
But there are such better ways of solving that problem!!! Yes, probably, but we have to know that's a problem we're trying to solve.
Now we know why software is, as a rule, crap. Can you imagine a team of chemical engineers designing a plant, there are sub-teams for the different subsystems, and during an integration meeting, whenever someone raises a points or has concerns about this or that working nice with the rest of the design, they have to drop to the floor and give ten so that the meeting is over faster! We wouldn't tolerate bridges and sewage plants built like that! It's fucking unthinkable, except in software!
Software was, as a rule, crap long before this ridiculous fad.
Most standups I've participated in (four orgs now) have been ICs giving daily status reports for the benefit of the manager in the room. People making up silly rules to hurry through the thing (like, say, "we all have to stand for this meeting") makes more sense in that context.
> they do the push-up/plank thing if you want to speak
Is this punishment for having standup? Fine, let's get rid of it. Instead, let's have a team meeting over coffee for 15min every morning where we discuss our challenges from yesterday, and what we think we'll do today, and anything keeping us from working.
I always read it as a kind of pushback against the meeting; the engineers saying "fuck this" to the project manager. But, I agree, whether it's self-inflicted masochism or basic corporate sadism, it's stupid either way.
I would be totally down to push a coworker in a wheelchair if they really did want to go and this was the only thing preventing them from joining us. Like my response to that woulda been "sure"