Interruptions at work in the open planned hell hole

Getting work done at work is an oxymoron.  Which may be related to working in an open plan office which when you look at it is more like a car park with carpet and tables. Tables by the way which are merged single units with little space on them. For the hot both a hot desking and clear desk policy is also in use. The nature of my work is highly knowledge based, but there is also a need to talk to people, except I would prefer not to talk to people if I could help it. There are days when I sit down and am so motivated and geared up to work it is unbelievable.  There's a pile to be dealt with and this pile is higher than mount Everest, but bit by bit the distractions kick in. Across the other side of the office a section of people chat away about their weekend, they laugh and joke. They have no idea how their silly noise is such an irritant while I'm trying my best to clear my head and concentrate on the problem in front of me. I know I can deal with it but I need to focus, I need to concentrate. With a little quiet and a little thought I can deal with it in twenty minutes. Make the correct decision and get an email confirmation off to someone who is waiting for the reply and has been badgering me incessantly the last 5 weeks.  Five hours later I return to the same problem, barely having written a single sentence and find my day has been dictated by everyone else around me. Stuff which is not as important has just been constantly interrupting me. Then it's mid afternoon and all the motivation and will power I had earlier in the day has been sapped away. I can hear a high pitched scream in my ears, it's tinnitus kicking in, now concentration can only be fragmented to a few seconds. I'm at my workstation sitting there doing no more than just wait for the next interruption. All I am is a machine to be interrupted.  Then tomorrow morning I'll be accosted by the boss who will ask why I still haven't done this one piece of work, it will be in an accusatory tone as if I been sitting there making cakes all day and not bothering to earn my wages.

The ringer on my phone is turned to mute, so it doesn't worry me like a crying baby, I can see a flashing red light on top of it and then can make the decision whether to answer it. To this extent I've now learnt how to own my phone. The number of the caller will flash up, I can then ring them back at my own choosing. If only I could do this with people. I know my job inside out, I can work it well and I don't need to really ask anyone any questions. I am capable enough to find my own answers, pick up guidance notes, read manuals, find the right regulations.  Even in ambiguous situations I am able to weight my choice and make a decision. This is the name of the game at times.  Decision making, doing it as quickly as possible and then moving on to the next item. However, some people just vacillate and never get to the decision point. They can't seem to make a decision and then ask questions, but they don't know how to phrase the question so it is asked in the most inefficient way. The question is asked in a way which takes up more time than necessary. Because what I have to do is assure them and put them at ease. Their inabilities makes my job harder. Everyone has done their job for decades but yet they still ask stupid questions, they still don't get it. They are paid to do this and they should just get on with it. Their inabilities are down to personality, not training or knowledge, they rather interrupt someone else than think through the problem. In many respects here it doesn't matter whether the decision is right or wrong. And in all sense if you're not too sure then you'd just err to the most cautious choice, one which isn't going to be expensive to the organization.  This way the customer can query and come back again if they are unhappy.  But while they ask questions they stop another employee from getting on with their job. Usually its me, and it's not like I'm the fount of all knowledge, especially when I hear myself saying repeatedly "I don't know."

Some days it gets so bad I just go to the toilet so I can sit down with my naked arse over the pan. I put my head in my hands and there is very little noise around me. It's sad, even going there when someone has had a full stinky crap can still be a relief. I just hold my nose and breath through my mouth. I know other people use the toilets to sit and look at their smart phones.  It's a place of contemplation or just a place of escape.  There are not custom made silent rooms where individuals can sit and be alone so they can get on with complicated work, where they can concentrate. These are things the employer just doesn't get. It's an employees' mental health and their productivity which is severely affected by hell hole open planned offices. 

Remote workers can be a pain as well, those who are permanently based at their homes. They don't know what is going on and lose touch with the workplace. When a finger on the pulse is necessary they just don't have it.  Keeping in touch with them time consuming and trying to talk them through how to work a computer program without being able to show them feels like the blind leading the blind. It is remarkable how many people are not computer literate or rather computer competent on the simplest of things. When a little knowledge can be so easily learnt by physically showing by example it doesn't work this way with home workers.  A normal two minute demonstration can become a twenty minute discussion on the phone. Time wasted, time lost and that important bit of work I wanted to do again is left on the back burner.

There are three moments when work can be actually achieved, the first is in a place, but that place may well not be the office, it could be at home or on the toilet seat. The seat where a few minutes can give you time to think on how you are going to phrase an email which needs some diplomatic response. The second is a time.  Some people get into work early while others get into work late and work late. When there are fewer employees around there are fewer interruptions. The third is while moving. I used to do a lot of study while riding a bus, I knew by direction and the feel of each turn on the bus exactly where I was and at the same time put in extra study time. 

Open plan offices are hell holes, if you don't want employees to do work, make their office as open as possible before long the business will go downhill, and if it doesn't you can bet your bottom dollar they will be supremely inefficient.

Horrors of Open Plan Offices

Whoever invented the open plan office needs a good kicking. I'm sure they are probably hiding under a table somewhere, in a conventional office. Because if they had any brains they'd realise there was a hit list and this is one individual who must be near the top. If not on the top, even, in doing a Google search there is some vagueness as to the original inventor. The word "architect" crops up.  Yes those people who design things for others but don't give a damn about the results, otherwise they would of designed them better in the first place and worked or lived in the places they designed. The hypocrisy is they don't.

Open plan offices are a cauldron of noise, they are unbelievably difficult to concentrate in, because there is always some idiot who speaks up loud or because of their own insecurities and psychologically unbalanced mind desperately seek attention. In the open plan office they can get all the attention they want.  Whether this is in talking about what they saw on TV, their pets, their family, sports.  The subject is irrelevant.  This is probably the biggest bugbear of any open plan office. Some employees need for silence to do calculations, read, or undertake any complex task requiring concentration it's essential. The open plan office takes this away.  Those individuals who have these difficult tasks are then under stress and strain, not just to do their work but also not to make mistakes. It's not like they are colouring in a picture by numbers, what they are doing is difficult and their need for clarity is essential.  Therefore mistakes happen and in business those mistakes can cost money.  Whilst an employer may see the advantage of cramming in employees tight like battery hens, they rather not consider these other costs.

It is mind boggling how employers mix functions of office workers under the open plan office. When mixed all out office war can take place. For example, a group of people who are constantly on the telephone should not be put next to a group who barely use the phone.  It is as though the telephone users intentionally want to stop or harass the non users from doing their work. Their job involves communication, not thinking and there is a blindness to understanding someone else may need to concentrate. They talk normally or loudly, they don't try to subdue their voice.  They fail to understand or see the effect of verbal diarrhoea.

In an open plan office individual's are more likely to be interrupted while they work. They are seen not just as sitting at a desk and getting on with the job, they are seen as available to others. Available to be spoken to, when they would rather just get on with it.  Some people also can not help but talk while they work, and try and engage others in what they are doing. Like the telephone employees it's as though they are looking for approval, as they discuss items or work. By discussion they take away their own decision making process, they share it. If uncomfortable in making a decision or because they don't have confidence in their own abilities. These people are a hindrance as they are being overpaid, and not doing the job they should be doing. But they are human beings, and it could be the personal need for social contact which makes them this way. Especially if they don't get the chance to speak to others outside of the workplace.

Hot desking. This is another useless concept bought in by employers with the advent of open plan offices in a way to reduce costs. No office worker has a dedicated desk, they may have an area but not a dedicated desk. Unless it so happens they have a disability. Then they do have a dedicated desk. However, by dedicating a desk to this individual there then becomes less choice for the remaining hot desking employees to sit anywhere else.

Windows. In the open plan office when one person opens a window the draught is felt fifty metres away in another part of the office which may be quite a bit cooler. On account of convection currents and sun light streaming through the window. Further to this some office workers like a little bit of air and may have a high body temperature, whereas those who like as much warmth as possible because they enjoy a hotter climate don't like the window open.

It is with a great deal of irony how open plan office may even be cited with architectural awards. Awards for all kinds of reasons, the most natural light, the most eco friendly, the most sociable, however the one thing they should be given an award for they are not. This is as suitable places to work in. The employees end up facing the brunt of it them.  This especially goes for the newer offices. The ones where the toilets never work properly, the air conditioning is ineffective or only effective in a certain part of the building so every other employee is baked like a jacket potato, or worse frozen. Lets not forget to mention how it is employers think when a lot of their employees are crammed into an open plan office those employees will require less stationary, or less toilet roll than they did previously.

The resounding effect of open plan offices is a great deal more stress and a reduction in productivity. You can tell the employer to you are blue in the face, but they don't hear.  At which the whip is cracked and you're asked why an urgent piece of work has not been actioned.  Oops, as you think back to a piece of paper which happened to be handy while sitting on the crapper.

Truthfully, open plan offices stink, in more than one way.