5 companies changing how offices handle noise

Open office spaces offer teams a wide range of benefits, including accessibility to colleagues and the ability to engage in unscheduled conversations.However, a new study highlighted a major downside to open-concept workplace designs: They make it difficult to concentrate, which can affect employee performance and productivity.The study compared the brain waves of adults who were working in an open office environment or working in a single-person, closed environment.

After interpreting the data, the study authors concluded that those in open offices had to concentrate harder to get their jobs done, potentially affecting how quickly and effectively they completed tasks.This doesn’t mean that open office concepts can’t work, though.If their inherent downsides can be overcome, they can turn into efficient workspaces.

And five companies have products aimed at solving one of those downsides, which is noise.Many organizations bring in outside architectural elements like fabric dividers to dampen the sounds in open offices.However, RPG Acoustical Systems now offers a specialty process that is designed to decrease the need for those kinds of physical solutions by turning furniture into dynamic sound optimizers.The process, called SoniQ Technology, involves making nearly invisible modifications to wooden furniture using a laser.

After receiving the treatment, standard desks, credenzas, and other vertical wooden office surfaces can switch from being reflective to absorptive surfaces.This helps reduce sound reverberation to under half a second, which RPG reports is the typical sound reduction goal in offices.

SoniQ Technology can be used alone or in tandem with other noise-reducing solutions.An effective method to address unwanted sound in an office is to mask it with neutralizing sounds.By overlaying a new sound on top of existing sounds, the collective noise level can be reduced to produce a calmer, more appealing workspace.AtlasIED sells a line of sound-reduction s...