Google Cloud workers to share office desks on alternate days

A unit of Google, owned by the world’s third-largest tech firm, is making its employees share office desks.

Alphabet’s Google Cloud, based in Sunnyvale, told employees at its offices in Sunnyvale and San Francisco to share their desks on alternate days as it moves to shed real estate, CNBC reported.

In addition to the Bay Area offices, the new desk-sharing model will apply to Google Cloud’s five largest U.S. locations in Kirkland, Washington; Seattle; and New York City.

The desk swaps will allow Google to “continue to invest in Cloud’s growth,” according to an internal FAQ recently shared with company employees. 

Some buildings will be vacated as a result, the notice said.  

“Most Googlers will now share a desk with one other Googler,” according to the internal document, which outlined how workers would come in on alternate days so as not to compete for desks. “Through the matching process, they will agree on a basic desk setup and establish norms with their desk partner and teams to ensure a positive experience in the new shared environment.”

If a worker should come in on an unassigned day, the FAQ said, they’ll use “overflow drop-in space.”

The new desk-sharing, reminiscent of the comic tug-of-war desk arrangement in the film “Brasil,” is being called “Cloud Office Evolution” – and hailed for “combining the best of pre-pandemic collaboration with the flexibility” of hybrid work. 

The move comes after Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai announced 12,000 layoffs and reductions in executive compensation in January.

The company has said it expects to pay $500 million to shed office space this quarter.

About a quarter of Google’s employees are in its Cloud unit, which is growing fast but isn’t turning a profit. Its revenue jumped 32 percent year-over-year to $7.32 billion last quarter. But that was below what analysts expected and resulted in a $480 million loss for the unit in the fourth quarter.

— Dana Bartholomew