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Engineering efficiency in open plan vs seperate offices

Andy Millar
Just for once I'm working in an open plan office *. I've been, from my point of view, very lucky (or rather, very determined!) - for the last two years I've worked from home, and for 15 years prior to that I have had a succession of private offices (in a company where the official policy was that only the president and VPs had private offices!)


HOW DOES ANYONE GET ANY WORK DONE IN AN OPEN PLAN OFFICE??? Sorry, that just burst out smiley


Now, thinking back to a LONG time ago when I was working in development teams of maybe 2-3-4-5 engineers it did actually seem to work well for us, we could share and bounce around ideas, however when I started managing the same team in a large office space it was clear that those discussions were also extremely disruptive to anyone else in the same office area **. The best arrangement I've worked in for team engineering was probably when we had 5 of us in a single (fairly soundproof) office.


Equally, having been involved in business management, I am very well aware that large open plan offices are cheap and flexible, but personally I'm suspicious of the impact on overall productivity, at least for engineering functions.


I haven't even started discussing getting the air conditioning set right for everybody...


Does anyone here have any views? It's a serious point.


Right, I will stick my headphones on, play some brown noise, and try again.


Cheers,


Andy


* Our company Mentoring scheme is being audited by the IET today, hence the fact I've been asked to work at HQ and prepare to be quizzed by the IET!

** I led a raiding party and commandeered a soundproof space away from anyone else where that team could work, before any actual murders occurred. I ignored the suggestions from the rest of the engineers that it should also be made airtight...
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    Dawn Fitt:


    Alternatively resort to the largest pair of noise cancelling headphones you can find which visibly act as a deterrent to those individuals who want to monopolize your time!

     



    Absolutely agree with you there Dawn! If I didn't have a pair of noise canceling headphones then I don't think I'd  be able to concentrate and get any work done at all!  I share a section in the office on the first floor with my colleagues in Communities, Events, Marketing, IET Standards and IET.tv. I haven't had a count up but I can probably physically see 100+ people from my own desk. As you can imagine it gets really noisy with everyone talking, having desk meetings, having phone conversations etc so a pair of noise cancelling headphones is a must!! 


    As the majority of my time is spent in the virtual world anyway, being 'offline' to my colleagues in the real world isn't that much of an issue as they can always find me in our virtual world anyway.... wink (why does that put me in mind of the film Tron??? ) 


    For anyone that does need to 'plug in to tune out' from the open plan office chatter, here's a link to my Office Soundscapes playlist on YouTube. I find ambient soundscapes (thunderstorms, rain, birdsong etc) great for those occasions when I need to block out the office noise but I don't really want to listen to music.


    Enjoy! wink




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  • 0

    Dawn Fitt:


    Alternatively resort to the largest pair of noise cancelling headphones you can find which visibly act as a deterrent to those individuals who want to monopolize your time!

     



    Absolutely agree with you there Dawn! If I didn't have a pair of noise canceling headphones then I don't think I'd  be able to concentrate and get any work done at all!  I share a section in the office on the first floor with my colleagues in Communities, Events, Marketing, IET Standards and IET.tv. I haven't had a count up but I can probably physically see 100+ people from my own desk. As you can imagine it gets really noisy with everyone talking, having desk meetings, having phone conversations etc so a pair of noise cancelling headphones is a must!! 


    As the majority of my time is spent in the virtual world anyway, being 'offline' to my colleagues in the real world isn't that much of an issue as they can always find me in our virtual world anyway.... wink (why does that put me in mind of the film Tron??? ) 


    For anyone that does need to 'plug in to tune out' from the open plan office chatter, here's a link to my Office Soundscapes playlist on YouTube. I find ambient soundscapes (thunderstorms, rain, birdsong etc) great for those occasions when I need to block out the office noise but I don't really want to listen to music.


    Enjoy! wink




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