After decades of trying to make retail “exciting” and “stimulating”, Walmart recently announced they’re going to permanently keep a low-sensory shopping experience on Saturday mornings, nation-wide in the US. TVs are set to static, store radio is turned off and lighting is lowered. These changes were of course made based on customer feedback and market research.

Depending on your preferences as an employee of such a company, this may either be great news for you or you may dislike it. Employers have changed, in some ways, radically the way employees experience work in the past few decades; from the open-office craze, to standing desks, cubicles, massive office lighting that is only controlled centrally, workplace muzak, providing free coffee, the list is enormous. Ostensibly those changes were made as they were thought to either make employees more productive or happier. Often these fads sounded good to a few people and studies have shown they are very harmful to many, if not some employees mental or physical health and productivity.

What changes have you seen in your work environment that you have liked or disliked? What is a fad that you never liked or it made your work environment noticeably worse?