Finally we can go again! The home work advice has been 50/50 since last week and we have never gone to the office with such enthusiasm. Goodbye video calling and hello colleagues who are a lot more fun in person. However, this return is not without a struggle. After 2 years of working from our quiet home, that stimulating sound environment in the office can be experienced as disturbing and tiring. This is not good for our performance. Today on World Hearing Day, Specsavers is giving tips on how to deal with noise in the workplace and how to make your working day as relaxed as possible.
Chatting colleagues and vibrating, ringing telephones – the bustling office floor is very cosy, but you may find yourself more tired at the end of the day than you thought. That is not surprising, because these stimuli can lead to fatigue, irritation, headaches and concentration problems, which in turn reduces your productivity. Too much noise in the workplace can have a negative impact on your health and work efficiency. Anne Venneri, hearing care professional at Specsavers, explains:“Precisely because we are no longer used to all these noises in the workplace in recent years, it now hits us extra hard and can trigger fatigue.”
Moreover, Venneri emphasizes that due to the new hybrid working method, in which a combination of video calling and physical meetings has become normal, noise pollution will only increase:“Due to the new hybrid working method, people will call into meetings more from the office. If people are video calling behind their desks, this leads to even more unrest in the office.” Venneri continues:“On top of that, now that we are finally speaking live again, this leads to longer conversations in between, which all affect concentration. It takes an average of 20 minutes before you can fully focus on your work again from the moment you were distracted. Taking care of your sound environment during work therefore becomes even more important.”
In addition, people with hearing problems are even more bothered by the increased noise level in the office. People with impaired hearing, tinnitus and sensitivity to sound run an extra risk of complaints in an unhealthy sound environment. They may even be completely exhausted at the end of the working day. As many as one in eight Dutch people already suffers from hearing problems (varying from mild to severe) and therefore the switch to the office has more impact than you might think. So it is something to be seriously aware of, for yourself and for others.
Fortunately, this does not mean that you have to look for your home workplace again. It is more important to take extra care of your hearing and the sound environment in the workplace, and to take into account others who may have hearing problems. This is the best way to deal with this:
Not only employees, but also employers can help prevent complaints by reducing noise nuisance in the office or making it more tolerable. This is how you as an employer can help your employees:
With these tips you can at least continue to work “silently” in the office and enjoy the fact that we can meet again at the office. Time to welcome the open-plan offices with open arms again!
