Unfinished

Earlier this week I clicked on an article on the Washington Post website about the newly designed office space at the Facebook headquarters.  We recently went through a remodel at my own office and the whole concept of an open-office was a hotly debated topic during the planning process.  The Facebook headquarters workspace is basically a (VERY) large open warehouse with desks, chairs, filing cabinets, and meeting rooms. Everyone can see what everyone else is up to.  There is very little privacy. Even the CEO and founder, Mark Zuckerberg, does not have an office!  I was mentally shaking my head at this concept... there is a reason for offices, a reason for privacy in the workplace; do we really need to add a new, cool, hipster vibe to something that is working well already?  As I flipped through the pictures and imagined myself trying to work in that type of environment, I came across a quote from Lori Goler, Facebook's vice president of people.  She said this of the open, rough-edged environment, "It's intended to be a symbol of what we believe at Facebook, which is that our work is unfinished."

The look of the facility was meant to demonstrate one of their core values, that their work is undone, that it will always be undone.  That there are always ways to improve and add more value to the service they provide to the world.  That made me pause.  

I spend much of my life trying to "be done" or at least APPEAR done. To have it all together.  Do I really believe that is an achievable goal? No, not really.  I wish it were.  Yet, I fashion my life and my outward representation of it in order for it to have a look of "doneness" about it.  Just like a big company that has made lots of money and uses a portion of it to install marble floors and a mahogany receptionist desk, valuable artwork and high-end furniture to show people that they can be trusted, because, clearly they've done something right in the past to arrive at this current state of glory.  

"It's intended to be a symbol of what we believe at Facebook, which is that our work is unfinished."  I think I need to find ways to incorporate symbols of this belief in my own life... to remind myself and others that I have not arrived and I don't believe I ever will, that I am a work in progress, that I am striving toward something greater than myself and it is worth the effort. My life should not resemble a highly polished memorial to all I've accomplished, it should look like a beehive of activity where each new day brings the opportunity to step out and attempt one more time to live what I believe in new ways and see how God uses that to impact the world.

PS - I still don't want to work in an open office environment.

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