Ten Steps to Achieve Acoustic Comfort in Your Office

An unknown worker, in response to a New York Times article, Beyond the Cubicle, by Allison Arieff, July 18, 2011, wrote the following internet comment:

“I currently work in a cubicle – my neighbours are a man in the midst of a divorce, a woman with a problem child, another woman with an elderly parent who should be in a care facility. The only cure for my personal hell would be a quiet room with a door. Perhaps my employer would then get his money’s worth from my workday... did I mention that I am across from the copier?” 

According to a study by sound consultant Julian Treasure, if you can hear someone talking while you are reading or writing, your productivity in the workplace can dip by up to 66%. Treasure has been calling attention to the “invisible architecture” of sound. His research suggests that trying to perform knowledge-based tasks in a space in which other people’s conversations are clearly audible is difficult, with productivity being degraded by up to two thirds. Treasure’s whitepaper Building in Sound also found that sound masking technology improved employee focus by 47% and short term memory accuracy by almost 10%.

Another study found that noise in the office also correlated to increased stress hormone levels and a lower willingness to engage with others. Which creates a tense Catch 22, given the trend of shared space and open office is intended to foster a culture of communication and social interaction.
So what is acoustic comfort and how do you achieve it in the modern office?

‘Acoustical comfort’ is achieved when the workplace provides appropriate acoustical support for interaction, confidentiality, and concentrative work. The foundation of acoustical comfort in the office is the ‘Privacy Index’(PI).

To work out the PI, imagine going into an office, closing the door and reading 100 words at random out of the dictionary.

If your colleague in the adjoining office can understand 5 words out of 100, the office has achieved a PI of 95. This is the definition of confidentiality.

Most commercial office buildings provide a PI less than 80. Sound travels from one space to the next through numerous weaknesses in the built environment. The sound of speech passes between the joins between ceiling and wall, through lights and air conditioning components.  Sound energy can find every opening, no matter how small.

A PI of 80 defines normal privacy.



There are three key areas of equal importance that need to be addressed to create acoustic comfort:

• Behaviour
• Design
• Acoustic Treatment

Consistently integrating all three will deliver a workplace that is comfortable, sustainable and supportive of both interactive and quiet work.
Ten Steps To Acoustic Comfort

BEHAVIOUR

1) Identify the work patterns within the office. Observe the balance of concentration and interaction amongst your team to create zones to support each.

2) Identify the pattern and need for speech privacy – how many ‘secure’ acoustic spaces are needed?

3) Support behavioural change: adopt mobile technologies and multiple workplaces to allow the workplace patterns you have identified to be successful.

4) Create protocols aimed at reducing distractions and the appropriate use of space.

DESIGN

5) Zone appropriately – have a layout strategy that keeps incompatible functions apart.

6) Planning – What is the effect on neighbouring workstations when locating supporting activities such as printers and copiers, coffee bars and eateries, entries to conference rooms where a queue could be anticipated.

7) Furniture – select furniture that contributes to acoustic comfort. For example, high partitions actually contribute to noise levels rather than reduce, because of the perception that people wrongly-assume they are enclosed, and don’t monitor the volume of their conversations. Lower-partitions encourage awareness of people around, whilst also allowing for light and views.

ACOUSTIC TREATMENT

8) Choose sound-absorbing walls and ceilings; in conference, meeting and training rooms aim for a minimum 80% PI. For open workspaces, floors, walls, window coverings, and ceilings can all be used to absorb sound. Specific solutions include acoustic ceiling tiles, carpeting, furniture finishes, curtains, and other ceiling treatments such as hanging ‘clouds’, banners, artwork and acoustical plasters.


9) Sound Masking Systems. There are many types of masking systems available, ranging from a table-top fountain to complicated electronic systems with multiple time of day settings. There are even sound-masking privacy apps you can download to play through headsets!


10) Look at using sound-rated wall construction materials – talk to your architect about the appropriate materials for use, for offices that require confidential speech privacy to teleconferencing rooms and open space partitioning.

This article was published in Sourceable.net in March 2015

Instead of tying people to their desk, tie them to their senses

Whilst the focus over the past few years has been on sustainability and the impact of technology in the workplace, the future trends is to design for productivity, creativity and collaboration. How can we better design to maximise human productivity, potential and performance?

Productivity is not sitting at the same desk all day with your head down. It is creating solutions, achieving outcomes, solving problems. This does not necessarily come from remaining isolated at your desk.

The world has changed. In the past, people had to sit at their desks if they needed to answer emails, but today, anyone can do that—or any other work—from anywhere. Mobile devices have released us from the tyranny of the desk. From a creative perspective, it is no longer necessary to make sure people are at their desks at all time.

Instead it makes it more crucial to ensure people have a supportive, well-designed environment that give them the freedom to work productively whilst connecting and brainstorming with each other. All their senses need to be encouraged to engage.

Designing a space with all five senses in mind can boost productivity in the workplace.  It can make employees happier, more engaged. Designer Jinsop Lee in a 2013 TED talk, postulated that the best designs appeal to all (or most) of our senses.

Sensory design elements such as colours, lighting, sounds, textures and smells can be purposefully adapted to enhance the work environment and increase productivity. Spaces can be designed to meet the requirements of all of our senses, the most obvious of these from a design point of view is sight.

Sight

The easiest sense to appeal to, sight can be manipulated most obviously by implementing colour psychology. Brighter colours, such as reds, blues and greens, are conducive to higher focus and task accuracy.

Blue is associated with calm, promoting mental clarity, control and creative thinking. Some studies suggest it can produce twice as many brainstorming results when compared to a red environment.

Citrus hues like yellow and orange, stimulating colours by nature, help people feel more alert, allowing for clear decision making and encouraging lively discussions.

By using colour strategically and following the basic principles of colour psychology, you can promote desired behaviors.

 Let there be light

With the sense of sight, the most important part of design is access to natural light. There is a strong relationship between workplace daylight exposure and office workers’ sleep, activity and quality of life.

Natural light is the most popular request by team members when interviewed about their requirements in their office. Focusing on natural light not only helps improve employee mood and productivity, it can also help save on cooling, heating and power costs.

Embrace art

Engaging the sense of sight is about visual interest, and an easy way to introduce this is wall art or sculptures.

Art that has interesting or thought-provoking subject matters not only infuses your workspace with character, it can also stimulate discussion and inspires workplace creativity.

By working with a corporate art curator, you can select artwork that conveys your company culture and branding, sparks employee imagination, and also supplements your Corporate Social Responsibility programs by supporting local, emerging artists.

There is also scope for art installations to change – so the artwork that stimulated and provoked your team last quarter does not remain the same year-on-year. The objective for any corporate art curation is to rotate, build and grow the collection, so it continually evolves and inspires your people.

The design of an office should not just address an employees’ immediate workspace, the design of the whole work environment needs to be designed to stimulate them, and encourage them to work to the best of their abilities whether it be as individuals, as teams or the overall Company.

This Article was published on Sourceable.net in January 2015 and can be viewed at https://sourceable.net/tie-people-to-their-senses-not-desks/