4 ms·

Coworker who is extremely loud on the phone. I get 0 work done when she's on the phone. She's so loud I can't hear people when I'm on the phone. We have an "ope

Coworker who is extremely loud on the phone. I get 0 work done when she's on the phone. She's so loud I can't hear people when I'm on the phone. We have an "open door" policy at work so if I close my door to my own office it looks weird. If I tell her she's being too loud I look like an asshole. We're moving to a new building and I'm going to be on a different floor than her and I can't wait. So many years of listening to half of a conversation is enough to make you go insane.

dman 10y ago
Strongly empathize.
Xcelerate 10y ago
As a graduate student, I was lucky to have an advisor that let me work on research from anywhere as long as I was getting stuff done. I tried to work in the office a few times, and a couple loud people made it almost impossible for me to accomplish anything. Coffee shops, despite the presence of ambient conversations, were much more effective for me. I haven't quite figured out the difference between coffee shop noise and office noise — I just know that I can tune the former out, while the latter makes it difficult to concentrate.
- Swizec 10y ago
  > I haven't quite figured out the difference between coffee shop noise and office noise — I just know that I can tune the former out, while the latter makes it difficult to concentrate. Coffee shop noise is irrelevant, office noise might be relevant. You automatically pay attention even if you don't want to. For me, noise cancelling headphones are a necessity. Impossible to get anything done otherwise.
  - TeMPOraL 10y ago
    Exactly this. What finally made me buy a good set of headphones for work was a cow-orker that would regularly come to my office to talk to a colleague about some project. Nothing to do with my work, but the words he used made me involuntarily tune in to the conversation every 10 seconds, just because it sounded relevant.
- Eric_WVGG 10y ago
  Your office was a couple loud coherent voices. Cafe noise is white noise. Right now I'm in a cafe that has 50+ people and thumping bass music, all sweet white noise. With a beat.
- barleymash 10y ago
  Have you tried coffitivity.com? Lol every time I tell people I use this, they look at me sideways. I discovered it a few years ago, and still use it just about everyday. It's basically just ambient noises from a coffee shop, and you can choose a couple of different "environments". I pop that on in my headphones, and layer on some instrumental music. I love it.
  - Xcelerate 10y ago
    Haha, that's pretty cool actually
pavel_lishin 10y ago
We recently had an office re-org (in the physical "take your shit to different desks" sense). Our manager lobbied hard, and succeeded, to move our relatively small engineering team and stick us in the corner, away from sales folks, etc., who are on the phone all day - and especially from the one person who was frequently on the phone and loud enough to go through my big over-the-ear headphones.
- khedoros1 10y ago
  Right now, I sit in between an R+D group working on experimental prototypes and a PM group whose members often (loudly) explain our products to customers during sales calls. This is after our previous move, about 8 months ago. For the last several months, my manager has been lobbying to move my group somewhere with a more reasonable noise level. At the moment, a couple members of the R+D team are discussing a new database schema, and I'm wishing that another manager hadn't swooped in an taken the place we were planning to move to a week ago.
pjc50 10y ago
That seems like a strange environment when you get the enormous privilege of a door but are discouraged from using it. :(
TeMPOraL 10y ago
> We have an "open door" policy at work so if I close my door to my own office it looks weird. At least you have a door. That said, I solved the problem of talking cow-orkers by ordering a second pair of the same high-quality gaming headphones I use at home. I turn on some music (or pink noise), and I can no longer hear anyone.
st3v3r 10y ago
Grow a spine and tell her she's being loud. Don't be mean about it, but make it clear that she is being too loud.
mikestew 10y ago
If I tell her she's being too loud I look like an asshole. Only to her. Everyone else silently thanks you. Don't let assholes define the narrative by feeling like an asshole because you asked an asshole to quit being such an asshole.
- dazc 10y ago
  I rent a closed office space but immediately outside my door sits a girl who thought it was cool to play music while she worked. I thought it was best to nip this behaviour in the bud and asked her to turn it down. This was 6 months ago and she hasn't spoken to me since. I sometimes say hello and goodbye but she just blanks me. Assholes will always find a way to be an asshole no matter what you do.
  - mikestew 10y ago
    This was 6 months ago and she hasn't spoken to me since. So she's even more quiet than requested. Sounds like a win. :-)
Grishnakh 10y ago
Do the office doors lock? I have a solution that probably won't get you in trouble with management for stirring the pot: stay late and sabotage her phone. Make sure to wear gloves, and do it in a way that's really hard to detect, such as opening it up and carefully cutting a trace on the circuit board which renders it inoperable, but is impossible to spot without someone else carefully examining the board for defects.

dman 10y ago

Strongly empathize.

Xcelerate 10y ago

As a graduate student, I was lucky to have an advisor that let me work on research from anywhere as long as I was getting stuff done. I tried to work in the office a few times, and a couple loud people made it almost impossible for me to accomplish anything. Coffee shops, despite the presence of ambient conversations, were much more effective for me. I haven't quite figured out the difference between coffee shop noise and office noise — I just know that I can tune the former out, while the latter makes it difficult to concentrate.

Swizec 10y ago
> I haven't quite figured out the difference between coffee shop noise and office noise — I just know that I can tune the former out, while the latter makes it difficult to concentrate. Coffee shop noise is irrelevant, office noise might be relevant. You automatically pay attention even if you don't want to. For me, noise cancelling headphones are a necessity. Impossible to get anything done otherwise.
- TeMPOraL 10y ago
  Exactly this. What finally made me buy a good set of headphones for work was a cow-orker that would regularly come to my office to talk to a colleague about some project. Nothing to do with my work, but the words he used made me involuntarily tune in to the conversation every 10 seconds, just because it sounded relevant.
Eric_WVGG 10y ago
Your office was a couple loud coherent voices. Cafe noise is white noise. Right now I'm in a cafe that has 50+ people and thumping bass music, all sweet white noise. With a beat.
barleymash 10y ago
Have you tried coffitivity.com? Lol every time I tell people I use this, they look at me sideways. I discovered it a few years ago, and still use it just about everyday. It's basically just ambient noises from a coffee shop, and you can choose a couple of different "environments". I pop that on in my headphones, and layer on some instrumental music. I love it.
- Xcelerate 10y ago
  Haha, that's pretty cool actually

pavel_lishin 10y ago

We recently had an office re-org (in the physical "take your shit to different desks" sense). Our manager lobbied hard, and succeeded, to move our relatively small engineering team and stick us in the corner, away from sales folks, etc., who are on the phone all day - and especially from the one person who was frequently on the phone and loud enough to go through my big over-the-ear headphones.

khedoros1 10y ago
Right now, I sit in between an R+D group working on experimental prototypes and a PM group whose members often (loudly) explain our products to customers during sales calls. This is after our previous move, about 8 months ago. For the last several months, my manager has been lobbying to move my group somewhere with a more reasonable noise level. At the moment, a couple members of the R+D team are discussing a new database schema, and I'm wishing that another manager hadn't swooped in an taken the place we were planning to move to a week ago.

pjc50 10y ago

That seems like a strange environment when you get the enormous privilege of a door but are discouraged from using it. :(

TeMPOraL 10y ago

> We have an "open door" policy at work so if I close my door to my own office it looks weird. At least you have a door. That said, I solved the problem of talking cow-orkers by ordering a second pair of the same high-quality gaming headphones I use at home. I turn on some music (or pink noise), and I can no longer hear anyone.

st3v3r 10y ago

Grow a spine and tell her she's being loud. Don't be mean about it, but make it clear that she is being too loud.

mikestew 10y ago

If I tell her she's being too loud I look like an asshole. Only to her. Everyone else silently thanks you. Don't let assholes define the narrative by feeling like an asshole because you asked an asshole to quit being such an asshole.

dazc 10y ago
I rent a closed office space but immediately outside my door sits a girl who thought it was cool to play music while she worked. I thought it was best to nip this behaviour in the bud and asked her to turn it down. This was 6 months ago and she hasn't spoken to me since. I sometimes say hello and goodbye but she just blanks me. Assholes will always find a way to be an asshole no matter what you do.
- mikestew 10y ago
  This was 6 months ago and she hasn't spoken to me since. So she's even more quiet than requested. Sounds like a win. :-)

Grishnakh 10y ago

Do the office doors lock? I have a solution that probably won't get you in trouble with management for stirring the pot: stay late and sabotage her phone. Make sure to wear gloves, and do it in a way that's really hard to detect, such as opening it up and carefully cutting a trace on the circuit board which renders it inoperable, but is impossible to spot without someone else carefully examining the board for defects.