Thanks to the clickbait-y title, you are here. But wait, don’t leave yet because Malcolm Gladwell and I really have something in common. We are joined by our mutual love for coffee shops. In 2005, the writer said “I hate desks. Desks are now banished” and spoke dearly of cafes where “different people are doing different things.” I understand because that’s the kind I also favor. In 2010, he wrote in the Wall Street Journal about his favorite coffee shops in London, Paris, and Toronto where he liked to work.
Everything tells me that Malcolm Gladwell is a free-spirited writer, a remote worker right after my heart. When someone asks if I am enjoying working from home, I am excited. I see in this generic question an opportunity for a well-customized, elaborate answer. I often go like: “I thoroughly enjoy remote work but I don’t always work from home, you see . . .” I then tell them why I prefer cafes or coffee shops over home offices or conventional office cubicles that I felt miserable in at most workplaces—even the ones that offered me the best ergonomic furniture and hot beverages brought to the desk. Yes, even more than those conventional offices that provided snacks at tea-time and regularly had buffets laid out for employees. They were all great places to work but I cannot say if I felt my best there.
For me, reading, researching, writing, or doing any other focus-demanding work is so much easier at coffee shops—especially for those who have a sober taste in music. The cafes that offer free Wi-Fi, clean washrooms, polite and friendly staff, and well-cushioned armchairs with tables that keep me from slouching are the ones I prefer most.
If a cafe can also manage to place in front of me a healthy menu with a good mix of Indian and Western snacks and drinks, they immediately get to the top of my list. If there are other laptop-carrying people in the cafe (“laptoppers” as I like to call them), I am animated, unlike Gladwell who claims “everyone hates the kind of people who write in coffee shops—especially the kind of people who write in coffee shops.”
Nope! I don’t dislike my café co-workers at all. We are a team; can’t you see? The presence of other “laptoppers” immediately assures me that it’s completely okay to come and work at that café. It obliquely conveys that the café owners won’t see me as a nuisance and that I am not encroaching upon an armchair that belongs to someone who comes to the café only for an hour and a half to chat with a friend or get a quick meal. Gladwell may not like other café-writers but I am sure that by now you know that he and I are like two lovers and worshippers of the same treasured object— although cherishing the beloved for completely different attributes.
Also, evidentially, my love is steadier than his. Given the recent social media butchery Gladwell has had to face after he criticized remote work on a podcast, the writer might have to push his café feelings under the carpet—well, at least for some time. I am sure people would click his pictures and shame him on social media if they saw him hunched over his laptop or jotting notes on paper at a coffee shop.
On the other hand, I can go on professing my love for coffee shops forever. I am only a common, happy remote worker who can easily flip tomorrow and start writing about the benefits of regular 9 to 5 jobs and spending precious life moments in office cubicles. No one is hanging on to my words to catch two-facedness and hate on me. That’s what happens to people who matter a lot. At least the recent backlash will reassure the writer about how much he matters to people across the world.
Funnily, in his criticism of remote work, Gladwell didn’t even consider or mention coffee shops, or did I miss something? Did he deliberately skip talking about other flexible possibilities of working remotely? Or does he feel writers like him are some special class of workers that can avail remote work options while others need to belong and feel part of larger groups? He only said:
“I know it’s a hassle to come into the office, but if you’re just sitting in your pajamas in your bedroom, is that the work life you want to live?” he said. “Don’t you want to feel part of something?”
Moreover, what is this whole thing about feeling a “part of something”? I have been working remotely since 2020 and have always felt a part of all the projects I have taken up since then. In fact, I have met some of the best reporting managers and teams after I began working remotely. And I won’t lie: many of my weekdays are spent working from my dining table, coffee table, and bed, and I can be seen rocking my jammies a lot more often than one would approve of or expect. I pick up my laptop and head to a nearby café when I need more focused time or when I want to see the human species.
Even during my grad school years (2015-2018), I sat diligently at a café at my college’s backside and worked on my papers, smelling the brew—and appreciating the company of other “laptoppers,” none of whom were from my alma mater or even remotely connected with the kind of work I did. We were a weird mix at that café. We smiled at each other and knew what the other person was up to. I remember a guy wrote jokes there; he was a stand-up comic. Another was a dietician offering virtual help to his clients. Another woman worked on a graphic novel and worked at an office for her part-time job when she wasn’t around. And the petite young lady from Delhi came to the café to manage the short-term hospital project for which her company had deputed her in the city. I was the only one finishing a Ph.D. dissertation there and am much thankful for the place. I can easily say those were the most productive years of my life.
I don’t even quite understand why Gladwell said what he said recently. Of course, he is entitled to retract his words published in 2010 (or even anything he said or wrote just yesterday for that matter). He is also just a human, after all—outlier or otherwise. Not as common as me—but a human nonetheless. People evolve and experience a change of beliefs. I don’t even know what I would have said about remote work in 2011; I was a regular office-goer back then clocking in working hours even on days when I felt completely distracted from work. I could once claim to be a full-blown atheist but of late I have been feeling more agnostic.
But then again, my commonness is my shield. That is, nobody cares to bring me down. I don’t know where Gladwell must be working from at this moment, but since the writer has once been a café-lover like me, I would like to give him the benefit of the doubt and soon find a good reason to not judge him at all. To be honest, I sympathize with him already—and the compassion has grown manifold since I began writing this article this evening. He also once loved working from cafes just like I do. I am sure he knows (or at least he has once known) exactly why office cubicles aren’t for everyone.
P.S. today’s post was written at The Artist’s House, Udaipur. I clicked the featured coffee pic there. No, they didn’t pay me to tag them but the managing staff, Geet and Swati were amazingly kind and nice. I am sure Malcolm Gladwell from 2010 would approve it as a productive workplace.
Ambika Singh,PhD 