Open-plan offices came of age in the 2000s, taking out the barriers between employees to facilitate greater collaboration.
According to Susan Cain, author of Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking, 70 percent of employees were working in an open plan when her book was published in 2012.
Cain credits the rise of open-plan offices to the corporate embrace of what she calls the ‘New Groupthink’. That is, elevating teamwork above all else.
But research has shown that the open nature of these offices actually impede good work.
A study called the Coding War Games found that the top performers among a sample of computer programmers overwhelmingly worked for companies that gave them more privacy, personal space, control over their physical environments and freedom from interruptions.
Quiet points to research that had similar findings for other industries. Open-plan offices have been found to reduce productivity, impair memory, elevate stress levels, make people sick, hostile, unmotivated, insecure and are associated with high staff turnover.
Excessive environmental stimulation and distractions can impede effective work, especially for introverted workers (who make up an estimated third to half of the population). The open plan feels especially inappropriate in the wake of the pandemic when social distancing is still important and many employees have become accustomed to independent workspaces.
So, if you’re stuck with an open plan, how can you improve it?
Office pods are becoming a popular solution.
They’re portable booths that offer privacy in the workplace for individual work or small meetings. They can also be soundproof, giving employees a space of quiet in the middle of a busy environment.
Businesses wanting to attract employees back to the office, who have become used to the autonomy of working from home, are taking lessons from flexible coworking spaces, offering a mix of spaces for activity-based working. The acoustic office pod is just one example with many potential benefits.
The benefits of office pods
- First and foremost, solo pods offer the solitude and silence often necessary for deep focus and creativity. They’re helpful for when employees don’t want to get caught in the office cross-talk.
- Pods can also offer privacy for phone calls, meetings or interviews. This is especially important when confidential or sensitive information is involved, and can benefit employees who have performance anxiety when they’re overheard.
- Pods can have health benefits, allowing more options for workers to socially distance while still coming into the office.
- Some pod businesses offer bespoke designs and size, allowing them to be tailored to different facility needs.
- Pods can also be portable, which can help to future-proof workplace options in uncertain times.
- Pods with good acoustics can offer a great space to record audio for content creation.
- You can find pods with attractive designs that add a creative element to a corporate space.
Where to buy office pods
With those benefits in mind, here are some businesses in the office pod market with myriad options and price points to explore further.
