How to Survive in an Open Office Plan

Photo by Marc Mueller

… and how to be more productive at work too 🙂

Let’s face it —open office plans suck. You’re utterly exposed with no safety from prying eyes, you have no protection from outside noises (or smells), and you’re expected to be able to collaborate at any given moment, leaving you with very little “focus” time. If any of this sounds familiar to you, please keep on reading for my survival tips.

I can very clearly remember my first month at my corporate job right out of college. On my first day, I reached the office a couple of minutes before my 10am start time. I had just spent the last 2ish hours commuting to the office (more on this later) and I was looking forward to going through orientation and making it to my desk so that I could unwind for a bit. Prior to starting, I had no idea what the office looked like because I had only done phone interviews, but I’d assumed the office was going to have cubicles just like all of the other offices I had previously interviewed at. To my surprise, I was so wrong. I walked into an open office plan and it was hectic.

I saw groups of people leaving meeting rooms and saying hello to those sitting and working at their desks as they walked back to their own. I heard the gurgle of the “coffee robot” as someone made their daily cup while the beep of the microwave went off. I could not help but overhear all of the conversations that went on around me. I prayed my desk would be in some far off corner, but just as my luck would have it, I was the desk closest to the kitchen and picnic tables and I was completely exposed to everyone in the office.

It was my absolute worst nightmare. I’m the kind of person that will literally die if people can see my screen. It doesn’t matter that I’m actually doing my job and have nothing to hide, I cannot. I don’t want you to know how many StackOverflow tabs I have open, or how many times I’ve re-run my code while I was working out a problem, I don’t want you to see my screen.

While that was going on, I just could NOT get away from the smells and sounds that were coming from the kitchen. The kitchen was almost never empty —there was a revolving door of people coming in and out of it all day long.

The custom of saying “Hey how’s it going?” to people working at their desks while walking back from the meeting room/bathroom/kitchen was also just crazy to me because no one could avoid it. I think it was because all of us felt so uncomfortable being exposed and were so unfocused that it was easy to get distracted and say “Hey how’s it going” back and continue this never ending custom.

I couldn’t focus at work, and I hid in my car during lunch in order to get some sort of privacy. During one particular car spiraling session, I remember thinking to myself: “I’m going to get fired from my first job out of college because I can’t work in this environment.”

Have you ever felt like that? If you have, I hope you know that you’re not alone, and it will get better! Now don’t let me just give you platitudes, let me give you some actionable steps you can take to survive in an open office plan.

Tips to be More Productive in an Open Office Plan

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Here are the tips and tricks I use in order to be more productive while working in an open office plan. These tips little unconventional based on other articles I’ve seen floating around, but I hope my spin on it can help you out 🙂

Invest in Noise Canceling Headphones

I cannot stress to you enough how much of a game changer Noise Cancelling earphones/headphones are!! Imagine NOT having to hear (or at least hear less of):

• Someone walking by your desk
• Random office conversations
• Someone microwaving their lunch
• Someone brewing coffee
• The sound of someone’s mechanical keyboard
• The sound of someone adjusting in their seat
• etc

The list literally goes on and ON. Noise cancelling headphones literally changed the game for me. It helped me so much in feeling like I was alone. I think I was so hyper aware of my surroundings because I could just hear it. With noise cancelling headphones, I was able to block out one really important sense, and this allowed me to actually focus on work, and survive in the open office plan. Sometimes, I wouldn’t even play music and just used the noise cancelling capability so that I could just drown out noise.

Bonus tip: People are usually polite and tend to avoid talking to those who have their ears covered. Get you some noise canceling ear accessories today to keep people from breaking your focus!!

Now, I know that the price on these headphones can be steep, but I promise you, they are so worth it. They’re also great to use at the gym — although I prefer noise canceling earbuds. If you’re feeling self-conscious at the gym, give them a try. They help remove a lot of distractions as well.

Change Locations

I was fortunate enough to work in an open office that had a couple of different seating areas like couches, picnic tables, and a game room. When it got to be too unbearable for me to be out in the open, I’d pick up my laptop and move. Remember to bring your Noise Canceling headphones with you to maximize the “please do not talk to me” vibez you’re sending out to the office!! I’d always aim for locations where my back would be covered so that no would could look at my screen 🙂

If I couldn’t find an option that covered my back, I’d then opt for a more quiet location with less foot traffic. This is where my office keeps its empty desks anyway, so this was a great option as well.

Changing my location was a great option for me, especially when I needed time to just think through problems (spec’ing out a ticket), before I started actually coding.

Form Friendships

If you’re a shy introvert like me, this is not easy, but so essential to your survival in the office. Why? Because your friends have your back. Literally. Your friend group can be a protective space around you so that you feel safe enough to do your work! There’s safety in numbers and you should work on forming your core work group asap.

As an introvert myself, I know how difficult it can be to make friends. I had to hype myself up for every interaction and started repeating this mantra to myself: “You are worthy of friendships. You can easily make friends.” Now, this was back in 2017, so at the time, #affirmations weren’t the thing yet, but really that’s what I was doing on the daily. I was positively affirming myself until I really believed it, and then the friendships started manifesting along the way.

Just as a disclaimer, none of the friendships I created happened overnight. I had to keep at it for months before I even made my first friend but girlllll was it worth it. And then that one friendship grew into even more because that first friend then introduced me to an actual extrovert who decided to adopt me. You know that one meme about how introverts make friends?? I am so thankful that I am that meme. ❤️

Whenever I was feeling overwhelmed by the sheer amount of people/noise in the office, I’d slack my buddies and ask if they wanted to meet me at the picnic tables and work together. They usually said yes, and that made working in an open office so much more bearable because I was working next to friends I was comfortable with.

Even if we didn’t decide to go work together somewhere, it was so nice to know that I was among friends. Having psychological safety in a work environment is extremely important and I hope you can find it too!!

Plan Your Day

As we all know by now, the office can be so distracting and overwhelming. But if you plan out your day, you’re giving yourself a fighting chance to stay on track and accomplish your goals. Planning your day allows you to prioritize tasks, set clear objectives, and allocate focused time to each responsibility. It’s like having a roadmap that guides you through the day’s challenges, helping you navigate through the potential distractions and stay the course. By taking a moment in the morning to outline your tasks and establish a strategic plan, you empower yourself to make the most of your time, maintain your productivity, and ultimately achieve your objectives with confidence.

Psst give this article a read on how I plan out my days so I can stay productive while having a really busy calendar.

Take Breaks

Sometimes you can have on your Noise Canceling headphones, you can be surrounded by friends, but you can’t snap out of feeling overwhelmed and you can’t get into work mode. When this happens, try and take a break. Walk around the office, go outside and get coffee if you can — exercise is so great for you!

Not all of us can get out of the office, so here are some of the things I did to take a break, without leaving the office:

1. Take a break from your work computer/laptop by jotting down your feelings in a notebook. I’d do a “mind dump” and write about whatever that was on my mind. It feels good to be able to get those thoughts out of your mind
2. Go to the restroom/somewhere private and stretch in there. I found that I held my anxiety in my shoulders and back, so I found it necessary to relieve the tension.
3. Get a water bottle/sippy cup and leave your desk and go refill it! Sometimes you need to physically walk away from your desk and refilling your water is the perfect opportunity
4. If your office has a wellness room, take advantage of it!!! In my office, that room is getting used because people really need to take that break

Even though we’re stuck with a 40 hour work week, I truly believe that you cannot be working for a full 40 hours a week. You need some slack in your work life too. Sometimes you need to walk away and take a break so you can come back and be more productive. It can be difficult, but please practice giving yourself grace when you aren’t being as productive as you think you should be. Life has its ups and downs, but just know that as long as you’re working towards something, you will actually get there.

Phew! That was a lot! I hope my tips and tricks help you, or someone you know, to be more productive at work. Good luck and stay safe out there!

Please feel free to pin for later so you can always get back to this whenever you need it 🙂

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