Why I hate "Hot-Desking" - A System Crash for Neurodivergent Brains 🧠

Hello all,

Let me tell you my experience with the workplace environment.

Since the corporate world realized that people could WFH and they could save money by decreasing the office space and introduce "hot-desking", the office environment and dynamics have never looked the same.

But, for someone like me who has a different - ehrm, special - brain, my experience has been absolutely horrible. Any office space with hot desking literally fills me with physical pain and deep anxiety - to the point that I would have rather stayed home.

Every morning starts with a gamble. Will I find a spot? Will I be sitting next to a window? How noisy will be the person next to me? No matter how many times I tried to explain why I needed a fixed desk, the response was often a shrug - "We'll look into it". In a large corporate machine, we are expected to "just adapt."

The Visibility Paradox ♿️ vs 🧩 

We find it easy to build a ramp for a colleague in a wheelchair because the need is visible. We don't call a ramp "preferential treatment". We call it access.

But because you cannot "see" Autism, ADHD, or Dyslexia, the accommodations required (like a fixed desk or a quiet corner) are often viewed with resentment by others, and I do not blame them. We fear that if one person gets a "special" spot, everyone will want one.

It is 2026. We have to be better than this.

When we force a "Linux" or "Mac" brain to run on a "Windows" floor plan, we aren't being efficient; we are causing a crash across our teams.

My Call to Action for CEOs, HR Leaders, and Founders: 🚀 Stop asking your neurodivergent talent to "adapt" with environments that cause them distress. Instead:

1. Prioritize Predictability: Offer fixed desks by default for those who disclose neurodivergence. It isn’t a perk; it’s an anchor.

2. Move from Equality to Equity: Equality is giving everyone the same desk. Equity is giving everyone the right desk so they can actually perform.

3. The Benefits of Inclusion: You have no idea how much loyalty you build when an employee feels seen. When the "sensory tax" is removed, the quality of output skyrockets.

Let’s stop building offices for "standard" brains and start building them for the brilliant, diverse reality of how we actually think.

And here is a cheatsheet for the managers out there wanting to know more!

The Famous Horoscope!

♈ Aries: Your brain will try to execute 45 commands at once, causing a temporary freeze before you impulsively reply "Sounds good" to an email you didn't read.

♉ Taurus: You will spend the morning quietly but aggressively defending your favorite "hot desk" from an intern who doesn't know the unwritten seating chart.

♊ Gemini: You have 60 browser tabs open, and while the mystery music coming from one of them is annoying, you respect its chaotic energy too much to close it.

♋ Cancer: The flickering fluorescent light above your head will feel like a personal attack, forcing you to retreat into your noise-canceling headphones shell.

♌ Leo: You will accidentally hit "Reply All" to showcase your brilliance, only to realize you attached the wrong version of the file.

♍ Virgo: You will spot a double-space in a colleague’s presentation and be unable to hear a single word they say until you mentally correct it.

♎ Libra: You will spend 45 minutes trying to compose a Slack message that perfectly balances assertiveness and friendliness, eventually just sending a thumbs-up emoji.

♏ Scorpio: You are currently running in "Incognito Mode," and if anyone taps you on the shoulder during hyperfocus, they will receive a 404 Error: Mercy Not Found.

♐ Sagittarius: Your attempt to "optimize" a simple spreadsheet will accidentally delete three years of data, but the new color-coding system looks fantastic.

♑ Capricorn: You are the Task Manager of the office, ruthlessly ending background processes (unnecessary meetings) to keep the system running.

♒ Aquarius: You are operating on a custom Linux build that no one else understands, solving complex problems that haven't even happened yet.

♓ Pisces: Your brain is currently buffering in the Cloud, daydreaming about a remote cabin with no Wi-Fi while nodding along to the Q3 strategy.