The "being watched" feeling is the big one for me. I don't mind wearing headphones because I love listening to music and I don't listen to it that loudly, but the sensation of feeling someone's eyes on you (to catch you on the split second you've refreshed reddit or facebook or something) is incredibly profound on the time it takes to zone into zen mode.<p>Anecdotally funnily enough, the opposite seems to happen for me when I am pair programming: each person keeps the other in focus, but obviously this only works when both people have the same objective. Not really related to "open office" issue, but thought it was relevant.<p>Or maybe I'm just a filthy procrastinator...
At age 32 my hearing is apparently at the level of a 66 year old. I'm not much of a concert attender nor drug user so the only real explanation the doctor could give for my disappointing audiogram was my habit of regularly working with headphones on (I always took care of moderate volume, mind you).<p>I wasn't expecting this result at all, I actually thought my hearing was perfect but hearing loss starts at the highest frequencies and continues to the lower frequencies exponentially. The route towards "Sorry, what did you say?" doesn't take as long as you might suspect.
The rules of thumb about "60% of maximum volume for 60 minutes" and "if you can't hear your surroundings, it's too loud" are nonsense. Dangerous volume settings depend on a headphone's sensitivity, the output device power, the headphone's isolation ability, and the recording. These parameters vary. Wildly.<p>A well-fitting isolating IEM can slice off 25dB of noise, more than enough to (mostly) eliminate background conversation noise at any location short of a hip restaurant. These IEMs tend to be so sensitive that they become earsplitting at a tiny fraction of the maximum output volume, way less than 60%.<p>Learn approximate dB levels of various sounds, compare various noise with a meter (even an uncalibrated app will give you a ballpark idea of what you're dealing with), and listen to music at an average 65dB or less (this will obviously vary with dynamic range of your music; occasional 80-85dB peaks won't kill your hearing).<p>One trip to a dance club or rock concert without earplugs (100-110dB on average in my experience, 120+ has been known to happen) will do more hearing damage in a few minutes than a <i>lot</i> of headphone listening while working. I'm pretty sure the busy street near my home routinely hits a 90dB average at rush hour, solidly in the danger zone compared to reasonable headphone use.<p><i>Edit:</i> To learn more, read the following:<p>- <a href="http://www.rane.com/pdf/old/note100.pdf" rel="nofollow">http://www.rane.com/pdf/old/note100.pdf</a><p>- <a href="http://nwavguy.blogspot.com/2011/09/more-power.html" rel="nofollow">http://nwavguy.blogspot.com/2011/09/more-power.html</a>
I'm not sure that employers that have open plan offices are actually "clueless". It apparently works well enough that they don't mind the productively hit. I think it is easier for developers to believe that their employers are clueless than to believe the truth - that they've weighed that costs and decided that disrespecting developers is worth the cost savings.<p>The open plan office sends the message: "To us, you're not a thinker [we have management for that!], you're just an expensive typist." The exception to that would be an startup that is forthright about needing the cost savings and doesn't try to sell this lack of respect as a "feature" (ease of collaboration!).
Is it time to get depressed yet? This has been a topic for such a long time. It was in people ware in 1987. I thought I discovered the topic when Joel (On Sofware) wrote about it in 2000. While a few people seem to enjoy open offices, the overwhelming majority of developers I know, or who chime in on HN, value a quiet place to work and dislike open offices.<p>And yet, not only has nothing changed, it seems to be getting worse. It couldn't be more clear to me that developers, at least on this issue, simply have no clout <i>as a profession</i>. There may be a few individuals who can make demands, but on the balance, these are decisions imposed on us, as a group, and we are apparently unable to do anything about it.<p>The really sad thing is, this isn't a situation where we're asking to fly first class, or for more vacation. We're talking about asking for something that will make us more productive and increase the value we largely hand over to our employers, simply because it's depressing to not be able to do a good job due to distractions.<p>So yeah, I'm depressed about it. There was a time when I read these essays and felt a bit more charged up, like people were starting to understand something important and that things would change. Well, now we have open offices.<p>I'll finish with another variant on my broken record: the industry talks constant about the critical shortage of software engineers, but it won't give them a quiet place to work. Actually, that last sentence is too optimistic - it won't <i>allow</i> them a quiet place to work. Those places exist, but companies often demand that their programmers spend 8 hours a day in places that are too noisy for focus.
I used to use construction 'headphones'. They do nothing but dampen outside noise - no music. It's a pretty good solution ... but a solution to a stupid problem because the right solution is more productive working conditions.
Another seemingly imperceptible disruption is vibration, ie "physical noise". I had the bottom-of-the-totem-pole pleasure of having the (open) office space right by the restroom, kitchen, and coffee machine.<p>The major noises were not the main problem; the problem was the stress of people beelining for either of the three with the felicity of an elephant stampede.<p>Add to this office congestion the pleasure of a female stampede of high heels or male Italian shoes.<p>Which is not to say that a coffee machine can't shake the foundation of the building like a malcontent washing machine.<p>It's driven me up the fucking wall, and it is by far my biggest annoyance with an open office.<p>Keep this in mind, the next time you or someone else goes on about dress code - or taking things easy. Hell, give your employees the option of company-provided sneakers. Then you can still dictate style guidelines.<p>Either that or give people a goddamn vibration-dampened fastlane.
As several commentors have mentioned, in ear monitor (IEM) type headphones have pretty good sound isolation properties. It's important to note that active noise cancelling (ANC) headphones <i>increase</i> the total sound pressure on your ear drums, while IEMs <i>decrease</i> it, overall. With ANC headphones, you have the environmental sound pressure added to the cancellation signal (which cancels according to perception, not according to physics) added to the pressure of your music. This tends to make them far more damaging to hearing, long term, than simply listening to music. The real solution, if you want to avoid hearing loss and drown out the environmental noise is to use something like Shure IEMs and a pair of shooting or industrial earmuffs. When I ran a lawn service in high school, I had a set of Shure headphones and equipment earmuffs, which blocked something like 50 dB of environmental noise and let me listen to podcasts at a reasonable volume while running a mower 8 hours a day.
Use noise-attenuating headphones rather than noise-cancelling headphones. A pair of properly fitted IEMs or a good pair of closed headphones will reduce background noise by ~25dB simply by providing a physical barrier to noise.<p>The distracting effects of music largely disappear if you listen to repetitive instrumental music - house or ambient music is ideal for this.<p>If you're concerned about noise-related hearing loss, Canford produce a range of high-quality headphones with integrated limiters. The limiting system was designed by the BBC, to enforce safe noise exposure for employees who use headphones all day.<p>While I agree that open plan offices are generally a bad idea, I think that OP is rather uninformed about the use of headphones.
I hope the open office trend dies soon. I've been to some swanky open offices with awesome perks but there are all designed to keep you in the office. I would not trade any of it for my current setup.
I work from my home office and travel to a nearby coworking space to get an occasional dose of water-cooler level of human interaction.
> Physical Hearing Damage<p>That's the one that does me in. Not because headphones cause ongoing damage, but because my ears have been damaged by several rounds of tympanic perforations and ear infections since I was a wee one.<p>From these I retain (amongst a number of other issues though thankfully almost no loss of hearing) a serious inability to wear any kind of headphones for more than 10~15mn: past that and it starts to feel like I'm getting needles jabbed through the eardrum and scraping around (this is not so exaggerated, the first time it happened I literally threw my cans away from me thinking some sort of biting insect had gone in and I hadn't felt it until it took a bite of my eardrum)
Interesting question: How many companies who use open offices style floorplans have executives who still have their own offices?<p>Maybe this is just another permutation of the out of touch boss problem. Nothing makes it harder to understand the downfalls of an open office than not working in one yourself.
I'm convinced that the ideal layout for developers is single offices, with doors, big enough for pair programming. Anything else is wasting developer attention and the opportunities for collaboration enabled while being in close proximity.
I HATE open offices, but man is this article full of absolute nonsense. I mean that in a very literal way -- it has lots of stuff that can not be made sense of because it lacks context or any actual meaning.<p>> I stress to my patients and the parents of my patients that if you can’t hear anything going on around you when listening to headphones, the decibel level is too high.<p>This is just stupid. It ignores type of headphone entirely. IEMs like the ER-4P (<a href="https://www.etymotic.com/consumer/earphones/er4.html" rel="nofollow">https://www.etymotic.com/consumer/earphones/er4.html</a>) have insane noise isolation (up to 42 dB). When using them, I can't hear someone talking to me, standing right next to me, with no music! They physical block the ear canal and create a seal blocking outside noise.<p>> As a rule of thumb, you should only use [personal audio] devices at levels up to 60% of maximum volume for a total of 60 minutes a day. The louder the volume, the shorter your duration should be. At maximum volume, you should listen for only about five minutes a day.<p>Again, idiotic. "60%" is entirely meaningless. It might as well be "Don't listen above FALASFDABURAGA". Headphones vary in sensitivity vastly, on some sets of IEMs -- 60% would be ear bleeding, deafeningly, painfully loud. On a high impedance, low sensitivity set of big headphones, 60% is a whisper. As a "rule of thumb" all it does is reinforce that the person who gave that quote is an idiot.<p>> If you listen to music with earbuds or headphones at levels that block out normal discourse, you are in effect dealing lethal blows to the hair cells in your ears.<p>... again, quotes from people who have no understanding that there are different types of headphones. MAYBE you could claim with fully open headphones this to be the case... but what is the level of "discourse"... <i>sigh</i>. Again, literally nonsense because it is impossible to make sense of...<p>> ... Music Is Distracting (entire section) ...<p>There exists multiple categories of music WITHOUT WORDS! Shocking I know. Most developers I know listen to these types of music because, lyrics are distracting. That isn't a cut against headphones.<p>> ... Feeling of Vulnerability ...<p>Getting to some sad points. Again, I hate open office plans, but come on -- really -- the feeling of vulnerability being caused by headphones? It is caused by an open office layout.
As someone with a life long case of VERY serious, diagnosed, and treated ADHD, one that is exacerbated by noise (I also have an auditory processing disorder); I often feel I have to take myself out of the running for any job in an open plan office.<p>Theoretically the Americans with Disabilities Act would allow me to ask for accommodation for this. Practically speaking, my coaches tell me never to ask for it, as employers don't get it and think you're making excuses.<p>But the fact is, I do have a disability and it's the cognitive equivalent of asking a person in a wheelchair to use steps to get to work.<p>And as an introvert, I find offices exhausting, the constant demand to be "On" is not only distracting but productivity limiting--especially pointless meetings where I have to work very hard to manage my limited attention span.<p>Yet another example of how silicon valley culture works for a tiny sliver of the population.<p>working from home is the best solution. I never go to a coffee shop--even that is too distracting. I schedule meetings with clients in chunks of time that are better for me (afternoons vs my very precious productive mornings) and I batch them so I'm not constantly context switching.<p>PS I'm not a developer--so you devs aren't the only ones suffering! Good writing and marketing needs thinking time too!
<p><pre><code> "[Noise Cancelling Headphones] So while it may work to cancel the noise
of your office air conditioner, it’s powerless against the voices of your co-workers
(the real noise you’d want to cancel in an office environment)."
</code></pre>
Um, this doesn't match my experience at all. My Bose noise cancelling headphones[1] are really effective at cancelling conversations.<p>Not completely cancelling mind you, but All-But-Cancelling.<p>You are playing music then too which further removes the voices, and you can play at a much lower volume for similar block-out-effects.<p>This does lead to some hilarious Boss-at-Shoulder moments when they have come to get your attention.<p>[1] <a href="https://www.bose.co.uk/GB/en/home-and-personal-audio/headphones-and-headsets/acoustic-noise-cancelling-headphones/quietcomfort-20-headphones-apple/" rel="nofollow">https://www.bose.co.uk/GB/en/home-and-personal-audio/headpho...</a>
Wear earplugs and then put your over the ears headphones over them. The sound of your music should still get through (mostly from around the ear, through your skull). I do that with classical music and it makes the music sounds like it's coming from very far. It's very zen. Like sitting in the void while having music come to you from a distant area.
> Side Note: Noise-Cancelling Headphones<p>What I've seen done by e-sports events such as WCS is to use earphones <i>in combination</i> with mufflers[1] to cut out the live spectator noise - yes the ones they use on a rifle range.<p>I can vouch that such a solution works as my room mate in residence would watch series up until ungodly hours of the morning: wearing no-name rifle range ear mufflers eliminated enough (broad-spectrum) noise to allow me to sleep with no issues whatsoever; I would assume it would cut out enough noise for concentration (given that they go as far as reducing the sounds of <i>gun fire</i>) - even without adding music to the equation.<p>[1]: <a href="http://catalogue.3m.eu/en_ZA/PPESafetyProducts/Ear_Plugs_and_Ear_Muffs/Passive_Ear_Muffs/Peltor%E2%84%A2~Optime%E2%84%A2_III~Ear_Muffs~nocode" rel="nofollow">http://catalogue.3m.eu/en_ZA/PPESafetyProducts/Ear_Plugs_and...</a> - this specific model is frequently seen in WCS.
"There are permanent physical consequences from prolonged headphone use. The effects accrue gradually, and as such people don’t notice that it’s happening."<p>You don't have to actually drown out the ambient noise; you just have to put enough sound that you control into it such that your brain is lulled into ignoring the totality of sound around you.<p>"People conflate the positive psychological effects of creating a cocoon of their favorite sounds in an environment of noise they can’t control with positive effects on their productivity."<p>The effects ARE positive, RELATIVE to the plain noisy environment they're stuck in. When I have an actually quiet workspace, I have no music playing at all, or at best something very, very low and without lyrics.
I've found Music for Programming's mixes to be pretty good.<p><a href="http://musicforprogramming.net/" rel="nofollow">http://musicforprogramming.net/</a><p>Dream Chimney's mixes on soundcloud also.<p><a href="https://soundcloud.com/the-dream-chimney" rel="nofollow">https://soundcloud.com/the-dream-chimney</a><p>In general, something classical, ambient, or minimal techno fits the bill.
I'm personally more or less a fan of open offices, but the noise really is a problem and unfortunate -- I wish the social convention were to treat an open office like a library, and louder conversations happened in private offices.<p>In the meantime, I find that using ear-plugging headphones alone with some ear-muffs (for like construction work) over the top of the head, without actual music, is reasonably effective at stopping sound.
Just leaving this here:<p><a href="https://www.somewhere.com/suttree/sparks/30629" rel="nofollow">https://www.somewhere.com/suttree/sparks/30629</a><p>The Isolator device looks amazing, better than headphones.
this quote is basically it: <i>Music Is Distracting</i><p>So, as someone who was taught from a young age that only one medium at one time was allowed, open plan offices are a pain in the tits for me.<p>I used to sit next to a bloke who play wonderful music, but it never stopped. Trying to debug anything complex was impossible.<p>Ultimately the only real way I could get round it was to use these: <a href="http://www.koss.com/en/products/headphones/full_size_headphones/QZ99__QZ99_Full_Size_Headphones" rel="nofollow">http://www.koss.com/en/products/headphones/full_size_headpho...</a> This blocked out most of the noise.<p>To get over the last bit of detail I used a white noise generator: <a href="http://mynoise.net/NoiseMachines/rainNoiseGenerator.php" rel="nofollow">http://mynoise.net/NoiseMachines/rainNoiseGenerator.php</a> (worth the support fee)<p>Now, this is still noise, but its constant and easily ignored.
I work in a 4 people office and already feel it's too noisy, too many people walking behind me etc. Maybe other people are smarter than me, but for me it's not a work environment if I should develop software. But my pay is not connected to my performance so I don't have much to complain about.
I completely agree, especially about the feeling of vulnerability. It's apparently something that not everyone experiences, but there's no way I'm going to wear something that removes my ability to hear someone walking up behind me.
I've carefully tuned my use of headphones and music to my preferences and to minimize distractions. Here's my list:<p><pre><code> 1. Earbuds that block sound, or over-the-ear headphones that block sound
2. Nothing with lyrics. Voices are distracting. I'm really just here for the
noise that's not other humans having a conversation.
3. Use a streaming service that tailors the music to my preferences.
Pandora was my favorite, but I'm currently on Spotify. I don't have to
curate my own lists and I still get music that's all similar and not
distracting. It usually ends up being trance-like. Anything "jammin" or
"fun" is indeed distracting.
</code></pre>
What I'm not getting here is how the generalization "music is a distraction" is justified. Was a large sample of music types used?<p>As for "being watched," I'm not particularly ashamed of my work habits. I do indeed post to HN (in case you didn't notice), read news, read comics (oh, forgot to catch up on those this morning...), keep up with my online peers, ... and I work. Watch me all day if you like. I'd prefer that you also get work done, though.
> Music is Distracting<p>Sometimes, the right kind of distraction is good. Even if having no distractions gives me the <i>opportunity</i> to have acute concentration on the subject, in practice, having the right kinds of distractions really do help me reach peak productivity.<p>If I don't have music or background noise of some kind, my mind wanders and I never really reach that "acute concentration" point anyways. But I work best with the right kind of music -- or even a TV show that's <i>just interesting enough</i> to be background noise (without capturing all of my attention).<p>That said, the wrong kinds of distractions truly are too distracting. The study mentioned that music with lyrics is more distracting; I know that my favorite songs (generally 70s classic rock) really do grab my attention away from work sometimes. Music where the words are unintelligible and fade into the sounds or music without words actually works a lot better. Also, obviously a really captivating TV show will definitely hurt productivity.
I found this article to be worthless. I work in an open office that is fairly
noisy. Although we in this area are mostly separated from the call center
people (there is only one in this section, probably due to seniority), but
there are some developers who are frequently loud, horsing around with nerf
guns, etc. My Shure IEMs block all of this easily. People around me have
conversations about which headphones they should buy, I show them mine, and
then they come back and say they want something with noise-canceling but that
doesn't go in their ears. Sorry, you want water that isn't wet, and it can't
be helped. Scared about having your back to the unknown? Get over it; it's a
personal fear that is able to be corrected. I used to be overly
self-self-conscious, but no longer. The One way, which is what worked for me,
is to do absolutely nothing distracting while at work. Ant website I view for
more than a minute is work-related in some small way and I have no
reservations about doing that for as long as I want. Right now I'm typing
into a black screen that is not echoing anything that I type back to me, so
anyone passing by me is only going to see what appears to be me pretending to
type. Let them think that, it doesn't matter to me. A guy to my left just
views time-wasting websites all day, every day. He would be the first-fire if
I had any say in this, but I don't care about him. Back to the
headphones... All of these things that could be described as "earbuds" are
junk. They don't seal the ear canal, so you don't get sound isolation, then I
would assume if there was noise in the environment's, you would be forced to
crank up the volume to compensate. I am listening to classical music from a
streaming playlist that is running from an mpd server on my home computer
through my phone (unlimited data). There is no distraction, as I have pruned
this playlist of opera and . Lyrical music and hip-hop is good, but too much
of it and you get the tape loops in your mind that can be distracting.
For these reasons I have been using ear muffs (similar to the ones you would use for lawn mowing). Currently I am using Howard Leight Sync. It's basically an "over the ear" ear plug when it's not on. You can also use them as poor quality headphones.<p>It gets hot, but it seems to be one of the best solutions I have found.
I use earplugs. They are cheap, comfortable e doesn't damage your ears. I started to use them when there was some construction work in my street. But I started to like it so much that now I use them on the plane, the bus, to sleep, and to work. 3M sells some cheap ones: <a href="http://solutions.3m.co.uk/wps/portal/3M/en_GB/PPE_SafetySolutions_EU/Safety/FeaturedProducts/EAR_Classic_Earplugs/" rel="nofollow">http://solutions.3m.co.uk/wps/portal/3M/en_GB/PPE_SafetySolu...</a><p>The problems are: People won't notice you are using it, and start talking to you from your back. That's a sure way to get weird looking faces from your colleagues.
It's extraordinarily presumptuous to suggest that headphones are an answer for many/most people. Fact is a lot of people do not like wearing headphones or listening to music/audio while working.
How would you even get "offices for everyone" as a 10 to 200 person growing startup these days (in SF or Seattle)? An open-plan space and then TI to build out offices? Find some 1940s non-tech building and rent there in multiple floors?<p>"Office with a door" would be worth $20-30k/yr in salary and $50-100k/yr in productivity to me as an employee/user, but on the supply side, it would be challenging to provide.
Hey I have a better idea! Let's just wrap each person in thick, acoustically impenetrable foam. Then our open office plan will be a complete success.
All decent points, but I'm perplexed how the author acts/implies that all programmers are going to be listening to "pop songs" or songs with lyrics.<p>I am completely unsurprised that there are studies showing lyrics interfere with concentration--I've been avoiding them while working for years. I've even chosen usernames in some music-systems reflecting the fact.
I wear earplugs on a regular basis and they are great for drowning out excessive noise. I do remove them off and on, especially if I'm in a meeting with someone or if I have to hop on a call.<p>If I don't wear them, I tend to get distracted and irritated by various sounds. Now, you can still hear things, but they are dampened which is soothing for me at least.
I got to know how music retards your reflexes by playing a reaction time test.<p>Just try the humanbenchmark.com reaction time test with and without music. When you're listening to music your reaction times will always be higher.<p>That's when I realized that I listening to music could be counter productive. Maybe some ambient rain noise or something would be ideal.
I have glass at the top 1/4 of my cubical walls. They happen to be angled in such a way that I pretty much get 360 view of the office. The reflection is soft enough that it's not as distracting as a solid mirror would be. I feel, at least for me, this solves the feeling of vulnerability with or without headphones in.
"Science says we're full of it. Listening to music hurts our ability to recall other stimuli, and any pop song -- loud or soft -"<p>Not very useful article if they assume I'm gonna be listening to pop music. If the writer didn't even care to talk about other types of music this is basically a very poor written post.
>If you listen to music with earbuds or headphones at levels that block out normal discourse, you are in effect dealing lethal blows to the hair cells in your ears.<p>I can not have normal discourse with my headphones on, even if they're off. And these are just a pair of normal over-ear headphones (DT-770's).
The past year I just got an office and so happy I have my back to a wall. The amount of stress from people walking behind me was getting too much to take.<p>I tend to find it funny that management that proposes the Open Office idea tend to be the ones who are in offices.
A pair of Bose QC25's has been my most objectively productive purchase this last year. I highly recommend anyone in an open plan office to buy some, or something like them - they're expensive but worth every cent.
I end up wearing ear plugs inside of headphones to block out the noise. Sometimes I wear both because I'm afraid of hearing loss. But it's uncomfortable. I just feel like I have a stuffy sinus.
WFH + Open plans are great and should generally be encouraged. The open plan facilitates communications and general discussion. I encourage my team to spend at least 3 days a week at work during our 'core' time (12-5pm/MWF). It gets a bit noisy and productivity drops a bit, but team morale is good and there is a lot of cross pollination of ideas and knowledge. The only difficulty I've had is nearby teams haven't adopted this approach (they don't WFH) so we have to be careful about our volume level when we're in the office.
<a href="http://www.amazon.co.uk/Bio-Ears-Silicone-EarPlugs-Protection/dp/B0013HGG0C/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1434990081&sr=8-3&keywords=silicon+earplugs" rel="nofollow">http://www.amazon.co.uk/Bio-Ears-Silicone-EarPlugs-Protectio...</a><p>Used these for years to help me sleep (I have insomnia and the slightest background noise wakes me up).<p>They also work brilliantly at cutting out background noise when I'm trying to focus (even use them at home if I have the windows open), silence is golden!.
Now to be fair I am in favor of giving employees isolated rooms to work in, however the reality is that at small startups they simply cannot afford that kind of office space. If you're concerned about noise and also the loudness of music playing in headphones, you can always get what construction workers use to block out noise:<p><a href="http://www.homedepot.com/p/Howard-Leight-Thunder-T3-Noise-Blocking-Dielectric-Headband-Earmuffs-1010970/203066856?cm_mmc=Shopping%7cBase&gclid=CLSUo6G2o8YCFdcSHwodwA8AGw&gclsrc=aw.ds" rel="nofollow">http://www.homedepot.com/p/Howard-Leight-Thunder-T3-Noise-Bl...</a><p>They look pretty intense but it's certainly one way to solve the problem.