Cubicle Inventor Says He's Sorry (Sort Of)

It is highly unlikely that many people would be able to pick Robert Propst out of a lineup, but if they knew who he was, quite a few would be inclined to curse his name.

Why?

Robert Propst is the inventor of the cubicle.

But before you all go marching after him wielding torches and impromptu bottom-kicking devices, know this: Propst, sadly, is no longer with us; and this: Even he lamented his accidental contribution to what he coined the “monolithic insanity” of the modern office.

Thirty years ago, when Propst, reluctant cubicle sire, came up with the idea for the much-maligned partitioned compartment of doom, he did so with the intent of improving the office environment, Fortune Magazine reports.

The way Probst envisioned the cubicle, it wasn’t actually a cube at all — it was an “Action Office” — and contained various levels of desk space so workers could sit or stand while on the job.

He reasoned that people would get more done if they could spread their work out around them in relative privacy and move around a bit.

Even the most bitter of the boxed-office bourgeoisie would likely concede that these are not the visions of a man hell-bent on plunging America’s workforce into perpetual Dilbert-ville.

It wasn’t until businesses figured out that they could cram a bunch of people in one big open space on the cheap that the cubicle became the office plague that it is today.

Sadly, it is unlikely the working world will soon escape the cubicle’s clutches. Cubes still take a lion’s share of office furniture sales — about $3 billion a year.