From big banks to small start-ups, companies around Australia are embracing the open plan office.
More than half of Australian office workers now spend their days in open-plan settings.
There are of course financial benefits, but also a corporate value shift that sees the decline of the highly rigid company structure. The fracture in hierarchies means also the lesser need for private offices.
Today's workplace is driven by creativity and collaboration – characteristics best cultivated in an egalitarian environment, which more often than not means Open Plan.
But open plan comes at a cost.
Just 1% said they could block out distractions and concentrate without taking extra steps.
Only 29% of employees believed that employees have the right tool to mitigate noise and distraction .
Employees in the most noisy offices say they are tempted to resign in the next 6 months.
Not all noise is created equal
Plantronics commissioned the Oxford Economics study to better understand how office environments can help or hinder employee health, wellbeing and productivity.
After nearly 60 years of on-the-ground experience in acoustics, we’ve learnt that not all noise is equal.
In fact, the sound of speech dwarfs all other distractions in the office.
The Center for the Built Environment at the University of California, Berkeley, for example, surveyed more than 65,000 office workers from around the world, finding that speech distraction was the top complaint.
"Speech distraction was the top complaint"
Human beings are hardwired to respond to speech. Even in the womb, babies react most noticeably to sounds in the frequency range in which most speech occurs.
This primordial response may have worked well for hunters and gatherers needing to stay alert to predators, but it is driving office workers nuts.
Some workplaces have turned to white or pink noise to mask distracting speech. But imagine spending eight hours a day listening to a TV station without reception? Should we be surprised that scientific studies have found that white and pink noise can release stress hormones, which in turn can impair the brain’s ability to plan, reason, retain information and control impulses?
The secret is not to eliminate background noise – which, let’s face it, is impossible.
The key is to minimise the intelligibility of speech.
Biophilic is best
Rolling ocean waves, a waterfall crashing over a cliff, the pattering of rain on a rooftop, or a soft babbling brook – there is a reason why these sounds are so calming.
The human brain interprets the slow, whooshing noise of water as non-threatening while masking other sounds that would trigger the brain’s alert response.
This is why a ground-breaking study from the Finnish Institute of Occupational Health found the sound of natural spring water was the optimal speech masker – above pink noise, instrumental music, vocal music or ventilation noise.
This research is reinforced by the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in the United States, which has discovered that water sounds – over and above even silence – elevate productivity, concentration and cognitive function and increase overall workplace satisfaction.
At Moodsonic, we applied this research to our own workplace, developing a system which combines soothing water sounds with nature-inspired visuals and intelligent, adaptive software. The result? A 15 per cent boost to productivity and a 32 per cent increase in creative thinking.
What does this mean for facility managers? It means you don’t have to resort to expensive retrofits to reduce the noise in your building.
While acoustics are best considered at the design phase, using the science of sound can bridge the gap between our intrinsic human needs and modern life’s demands – and can help you create more productive places for people.
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