Comments on: Office work: sounds good

By: Dave

Dave — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 13:34:04 +0000

You know, Janet, I hadn’t focused on the “forty clerical workers, all women.” I’m guessing the researchers hired temps (as my company did, years ago, to try out job aids we were developing for an application). I’m surprised that today you could hire 40 people like that and have them all be women.

The inability to control the environment — or the parts of it I care about — is a sure path to frustration for me. I recently worked at a client location with the PA-paging I mentioned. When no one was getting paged, you heard one of those ghastly pop / lite-rock radio stations. That didn’t much matter to people working on the manufacturing lines (they had a hard time hearing the pages if the machinery was running). For me, though, it was almost as big a boost to my productivity as the woofer/tweeter combination of the golden retriever and Jack Russell whose owners used to leave them outside all the ever-lovin’ day while I worked from home. BARK yip BARK yip yip BARK BARK yip.

Another horror comes to mind: speaker phones in a cubicle. I wanted to take up a collection for one downsized manager (kept her staff, lost her private office) so she could buy a $30 headset and spare us at least the other half of the conversation.

By: Janet Clarey

Janet Clarey — Mon, 16 Jun 2008 13:18:12 +0000

Just reading the article has resulted in a rise in my epinephrine level simply because the study is grounded in stereotypical social norms around women’s work. Forty women typing, filing, and doing simple accounting? Who the ‘eff types anymore?
Anyway, I’ve always been bothered by noise. I once worked with a real chatterbox. It was kind of like the dripping faucet. At first it’s just a minor annoyance but it gets worse over time until listen to the person breath is bothersome. I always wanted an air horn at my desk. Instead, I opted for my iPod (which created an HR meeting or two BTW).

By: Dave

Dave — Sat, 14 Jun 2008 01:36:31 +0000

When I was writing this post, I couldn’t help thinking of a former coworker who favored clunky jewelry. She also couldn’t type well, and some days the thump thumb of chunky bracelets against her desk was enough to make me think the Cistercians have it right after all.

After a while, I bought a little CD player, and when I needed to concentrate, I’d put string quartets or something on. My coworker, who popped into my cubicle a lot, wouldn’t interrupt me if I had the headphones on, unless it was something serious (like the boss being angry with her). So after a while I left them on even if the music wasn’t playing.

At the end of a particularly grueling project, the boss gave me a token gift: ten yards or so of yellow plastic tape.

By: snarkolepsy

snarkolepsy — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 23:46:56 +0000

Those noise canceling headphones are nice. Although quite antisocial at the office. Just say’in.