cubicle farm noise

October 29, 2009 6:04 PM

There is a laud/noisy colleague in the cubicle farm office. Any suggestions how to deal with the situation?

I work in a big company - this person is very laud especially when she is on the phone. She works for another department within the company and I don't know her personally so I don't really feel comfortable having a discussion with her at all.

I contacted HR to ask their advice regarding how to deal with her. They said they will speak to her manager. I also suggested maybe they can start cubicle etiquette initiative to make people more aware that they work in shared office environment and be considerate of other people.

There has been no change and a month later I contacted HR for the second time. They said they will again speak to her manager also suggested I should speak to her myself in person.

Another person from my team also spoke to her manager and he seemed reluctant to deal with it, I am afraid nobody has spoken to her yet.

What are my options here?
1. What is the best way to deal with her without having to speak to her?
2. Is it feasible to pursue HR for the third time?
or
3. If you think as a last resort I should make the move and speak to her myself, what's the best way to do it?

I was wondering is it OK for HR to put me in a position to somewhat confronting her? I was wondering shouldn't the company have policies to provide reasonable working environment for its employees?

I work for an big international company in Australia if that matters.

Thanks.

posted by neworder7 to work & money (15 comments total)

Is it part of her job though? I could understand being upset if she's making loud personal calls, but if it's work-related you don't have much of a complaint to make.
posted by pravit at 6:06 PM on October 29

Get some headphones. This is from twenty years experience working with 2,500 people. My building is a block long, and filled with people exhibiting every sort of wierd behavior that you can imagine.
posted by fixedgear at 6:11 PM on October 29 [1 favorite has favorites]

Most of the time work related sometimes not, is it really important the matter of subject on the phone? There are other people around me with role similar to hers and they speak at reasonable levels. Also it is happening not just on the phone but most of the time she speaks.
posted by neworder7 at 6:14 PM on October 29

The headphones idea is good. Also, when we had a loud talker in my part of the building, we complained to our manager who complained to the loud talker's manager. Some people need to actually be told to use their inside voice.
posted by birdherder at 6:21 PM on October 29

I don't know, obviously, how your company generally deals with things like this and I'm not saying it's right...

But if this noisy employee is valuable to the company then it might be worth being a bit more passive (maybe wearing headphones as fixedgear suggests) and not complaining too much.

I've worked in some companies where if this noisy person happened to be valued and I annoyed them by asking them to pipe down: I'd have been the one to go and they'd be still happily blathering on the phone.
posted by selton at 6:23 PM on October 29

Nthing headphones.
posted by Perplexity at 6:35 PM on October 29

Nothing at all?
posted by neworder7 at 6:39 PM on October 29

I am afraid nobody has spoken to her yet.

This doesn't have to be a confrontation. I'm a loud talker sometimes. I know I'm a loud talker, but I don't always know when I'm talking too loud. It is reasonable for people--even people I don't know--to ask me to speak more quietly in the office. Provided they don't call me names or yell, I am happy to comply.

Go over to her when she finishes a call, introduce yourself, and politely ask her to speak more quietly on the phone. Assume she doesn't know she's annoying you, and act accordingly.
posted by Meg_Murry at 6:39 PM on October 29 [3 favorites has favorites]

Some people have loud voices; in some cases, because they have poor hearing, so it's hard to hear and modulate their own voice. Giving the loud talker a phone that has adjustable volume helps; sneak over, and bump the volume up 1 notch. Extra padding/sound proofing helps, too. You can suggest these remedies to HR.

Talk to your manager, explain that the loud talker is distracting; get permission to use headphones, and maybe play white noise. Maybe you can talk HR or your manager into getting you some nice noise-canceling headphones.

Changing one's voice is pretty difficult. It may not actually be etiquette, there are a lot of cultural factors involved in how people speak. HR or a manager mentioning it is unlikely to change it. They could send her to speech therapy or voice lessons, which would be likely to help.
posted by theora55 at 6:40 PM on October 29 [2 favorites has favorites]

I was going to come on and say what theora55 said, but they beat me to it. So, I'll just agree. Some people just have loud voices. I'm not sure if there's anything HR can do about it, and you may have to take everyone's advice and get headphones.
posted by patheral at 7:03 PM on October 29

Chiming in as someone who is partially deaf/can get loud. I'm going to add that it's always made me feel really bad when someone has to tell me to "calm down" (associating the strength of my voice with being excited) or does that stupid "Shhh!" thing. I realize that I have a naturally strong voice that is probably due to my hearing impairment, but a lot of the time people don't realize this -- she has probably dealt with such problems her entire life.

Does HR know if she has such an impairment? They would be more fit to ask her than for you to randomly walk up to her and suggest she "tone it down."

If part of her job is to sit on phones all day, she's right in the middle of the farm, and HR isn't willing to even look into it no less act on it, I'd definitely go with the alternatives people are suggesting as long as your company is fine with it.

That said, are you new? I keep to myself in the workplace, but most of us have or will end up working with someone like this. You eventually learn to drown it out. But that's eventually.
posted by june made him a gemini at 7:29 PM on October 29

I tend to get loud when I'm excited or agitated, without even realizing it. A number of years ago I worked on-site at a client for about 9 months; it was only in the last month that I learned that some of the other employees (not the people on my team, but rather folks on other teams who were working in the vicinity - kind of like the relation between you and your loud-talker) were calling me "the loudest thing in the office."

I felt so BAD about that - it honestly wasn't something that had ever even occurred to me (even though it should have). I really wish one of the inconvenienced people had casually dropped by to let me know my volume was affecting their work. Furthermore, it's ALWAYS so unsettling to find out that people have been annoyed with and talking about you without ever talking TO you, and it's a rare bit of office talk that doesn't eventually wind its way back to its target; wouldn't you prefer to find out directly that there was a problem rather than go on your merry way without ever realizing you were leaving a trail of annoyed coworkers in your wake? It doesn't have to be confrontational - heck, you could even blame it on the flimsy cubicle walls or your own difficulties in tuning out distractions if you want to mitigate the accusatory aspect of what you say.
posted by DingoMutt at 11:36 PM on October 29

If you have a problem with somebody it's YOUR problem and YOUR responsibility (to yourself) to sort it out. Passing it off to somebody else is unfair. It's unfair on the somebody else who now has to deal with your crap, and unfair on the loud talking person who doesn't need to be subjected to this kind of "chinese whispers" runaround where somebody says that somebody else says that they are annoying.

When you're 14 it's perhaps usual to ask your more confident friends to deal with awkward social interaction for you ("my friend fancies you!") but as an adult it's really about time to get a grip and do it yourself.

There's various ways you could make it less of a challenge -
- you could try and get to know this person a little, first
- remember that it's not really a big deal, you're just asking them to do something, this should be a normal part of the working day
- smile and be upbeat when saying it, don't act like somebody just died.

Don't apologise, don't blame yourself, and don't tell lies just to make it easier ("It's not you, I'm just easily distracted").
posted by emilyw at 3:43 AM on October 30

I have exactly the same problem. I use earplugs or headphones. Not only does it help, it lets people know that you are busy working and don't have time to talk/gossip.
posted by jmmpangaea at 5:40 AM on October 30

Oh god, I feel for you. In fact I was going to post a very similar question, only it's not just one person; I am FUCKING SURROUNDED BY NOISE. Headphones do not help. I am severely hearing impaired. I am almost deaf without my hearing aids, and I can turn them off and it still does not help. It's nearly driving me to murderous rage. So you have my deepest sympathies.

What I did, and I'm desperately hoping this will work, is explain to my boss that the constant noise is distracting me from doing my work. I cannot focus on what I'm supposed to be doing, and I've been making more mistakes because of it. I suggested moving to a different cubicle. She can't do it right now because there are other personnel shuffles about to happen, but it should be within the next few weeks. Hopefully I'll be out of this motherfucking job by then anyway
posted by desjardins at 7:01 AM on October 30 [2 favorites has favorites]