Quiet down the frustrating Open Space Office noises

I am and always will be the enemy of the "lets have an Open Space office" idea. From multiple articles, blog posts and research I know that Open Space makes us, software developers, sick. In the worst case, we have to share the Open Space office with guys from marketing, management, etc. and this makes us even more sick! I guess that to some guys it's simply not clear that developers need to work in peace if they are to build a good quality software. What talent do you need to have to concentrate on design of you component or some algorithm when 15 of your 50 neighbours run around, speak on the phone or simply talk with each other? If you are able to focus on your work in such an environment then you are either deaf or you have some supernatural skills of shuting down your ears while working. Most project managers can't understand that developers are humans too and can get frustrated from time to time. The fact that people are half effective at work does not seem to be a problem for the management as well. This results in developers changing their jobs... or simply geting crazy... but who cares anyway? The office must be cheap! (Btw. in reality it isn't, but this is differnt subject and probably even harder for the managers to understand.) Like Scott Ambler once said "Management people are insane!" ... and I agree completely.

Now, why do I write about it? Well, as you may have guessed, I acctualy work in an Open Space environment. However, instead of chaning my job (which I probably will do sooner or later) I decided to find some other solution to this "unfriendly development environment" problem.


The Head Phones with Noise Reduction system!

Short story

The Noise Reducing head phones were wandering around my mind for many years before I actually got them. I saw them for the first time when I was flying to US for my high school abroad year (quite a while ago). A small guy wearing the Bose phones was siting in front of me. I remember him reading his book. He looked relaxed and seemed to enjoy the music among all this airplane noise. After few weeks I decided to find out something about his phones on the Internet. (They really must have seemed special to me.) When I saw the description and the price, I understood that they are state-of-the-art technology which I can not afford at the moment.

The head phones reapeard in my life for the second time when my girlfriend joined the team working in a large Open Space office. She complained about the noise, was frustrated, couldn't concentrate on her work, (paste some other usual stuff here if you like,) etc. Frustration is not helping to build a good relationship so we sat down together and discussed about it... and
... finally... "do you think the noise reducing headphone could help?", "why don't we try it?"

The effect

You would be amazed how much noise this little toy is able to reduce. Just put them on your head, turn them on and wuala, the usual noises are reduced by 70-80% (or even more). Turn some music on at the minimal loudness level and you won't be able to hear anything from outside! Its simply amazing!

The headphones worked like a cure for the Open Space sickness. After few days there was no frustration anymore, no concentration problems as well. Everyone in the office wanted to check them out and everyone who tried them bought them after some time!

The only wonder was that the management guys at our corporation who actually were aware of the problem and have seen their employees solve it on their own, did not agree to sponsor this noise reducing head phones to them. The clear efficency gain per person, the low ammount of frustration, etc. were not good enough arguments. What can I say? Stupid.

Models

I don't want to recomment any particular product here. There are many on the market so you can choose whichever you want. They all work very good. My personal pick was Bose QuietComfort 15. My girlfriend has Bose QuietComfort 3 model and is also very satisfied with its performance.

The Business of Software

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