Ecophon Acoustic Bulletin

Ill. Logica Call Centre, Bridgend, UK

A lot has been written about working conditions in call centres and other customer contact centres, but actually very little about acoustics. Apart from the fact that they are noisy and that employees tend to suffer from noise exposure similar to that of industry workers.
That is why, the French Stadardization body AFNOR, supported by INRS, a French Institute competent in the area of occupational risk prevention, organizes a full day on the subject. Some of the contributions:
- ergonomical approach
- hearing risks related to call centre work
- acoustic perfomance of call centre facilities: descriptors, workstation treatment vs room acoustic treatment, developments in head set technology and training of workers.

Venue: AFNOR, St Denis
Date: 19th of November, 9.15 - 17.15

Access the invitation

Posted by Marc Janssen at 9:11 AM | Permalink

Open office acoustics is today probably one of the most active architectural acoustics areas in terms of standardization.
Several standards, both national and international provide us with a powerful set of descriptors.

Interview (1,47 minutes) with Pierre Chigot, Concept Developer - Offices, Ecophon France.

By Tina Frisbæk Jensen, Concept Developer - Offices, Ecophon Denmark.

Posted by Marc Janssen at 9:38 AM | Permalink

Erling Nilsson, Acoustic Specialist, Ecophon.

Some reflections on the afternoon's session about acoustic for open-plan spaces. It was interesting to note that there exists some consencus concerning evaluation of the acoustical conditions in open-plan spaces. Measures like DL2 and DLf were frequently used in the presentations as well as methods for transforming these values into user friendly descriptors like e.g. radius of comfort. A good start of the conference and it will be really interesting to take part of coming events at one of the largest conferences ever.

Posted by Marc Janssen at 7:52 PM | Permalink

Four architecture students from KTH in Stockholm received the first price at the the Future Workplace contest. Their proposal called “Absorbing Transparency” convinced the jury.

High demands on acoustics
They choose to create a room structure with high acoustic features to secure that transparency does not lead to an increase of soundlevels. The focus is on creating a mentally relaxing environment, both visually as well as acoustically. The design should provide the activities that are sensitive to or generate noise to be limited by the room interior.

Continue reading "ABSORBING TRANSPARENCY - A WINNING THEME" »

Posted by Marc Janssen at 2:45 PM | Permalink

As previously announced, specific sessions on Open plan office acoustics respectively Call Centre acoustics took place yesterday 4th July at the European Forum on Effective Solutions for Managing Occupational Noise Risks in Lille (France).

The sessions gathered approxilately 80 persons and vivid disussions took place after the presentations.

Continue reading "Successful open plan office acoustics sessions at Noise at Work Forum in Lille, France" »

Posted by Pierre Chigot at 11:33 PM | Permalink

Ecophon co-organised yesterday with AFNOR, the French standardization body, a seminar called “Office Acoustics” (see invitation). A broad representation from various stakeholders of the office sector confirmed the interest for tools to support the acoustic planning of offices. NF S31-080 is definitely one.

Continue reading ""Acoustics in offices" gathered more than a hundred in Paris" »

Posted by Pierre Chigot at 11:46 AM | Permalink

A Canadian guide defines best practice in sustainable, public financed office buildings. In section 2.9.1, named "Flanking and Isolation", performance criteria and methods are addressed:

Continue reading "True insulation performance between offices - Canadian guidelines" »

Posted by Pierre Chigot at 10:42 PM | Permalink

As previously announced, here, French standard NF S31-080 on acoustic quality of offices was published in January 2006.

Continue reading "Great interest for NF S31-080 in France" »

Posted by Pierre Chigot at 6:00 PM | Permalink

According to Michael Brill (see ref. below), founder of the North American workplace consultancy firm Bosti, the cellular (private) office layout encourages communication, compared to the traditional cubicle (open plan) layout.

Continue reading "Can cellular offices be more fit for communication?" »

Posted by Pierre Chigot at 9:02 PM | Permalink

When the Dutch energy company Essent refurbished one of their open plan offices, it was decided that the room should be separated in several zones.

Continue reading "XL size office screens" »

Posted by Pierre Chigot at 9:11 AM | Permalink

Institute for Research in Construction of the National Research Council of Canada is a well known research centre on acoustics.

The Acoustics Department, headed by John Bradley has been conducting over the years extensive research on open plan acoustics.

Continue reading "Extensive research on Open Plan acoustics" »

Posted by Pierre Chigot at 10:50 AM | Permalink

"Sound design of open plan offices" is a Nordic research initiative, partly financed by the Nordic Innovation Center to identify room acoustic parameters and measurement methodology for open-plan offices. The objective is to guarantee an appropriate sound environment for open plan office workers. This includes extensive case studies of typical open plan offices in Denmark, Finland, Norway and Sweden.

Under the coming two years, the project will involve open plan and room acoustics specialists from five Nordic acoustic consultancy firms Helimäki Ltd, Delta Acoustics, Brekke & Strand, Erling Nilsson Akustik and Ingemansson Technology

Ecophon is initiative taker and owner of the project, to be ended 2008.

Project Manager is Anna Berglöw, Ingemansson Technology.

Communication of the findings to the architect profession as well as open office end-user organisations are important aspects of the project.

Continue reading "Nordic acoustic consultancy firms investigate open plan acoustics" »

Posted by Pierre Chigot at 10:52 AM | Permalink

NF S31- 080, Acoustics - Offices and associated areas - Acoustic performance levels and criteria by type of area, published January 2006, is the first French standard on office acoustics. It is designed as a reference document for clients to express their requirements, as well as a guide-line for office designers.

Continue reading "New French standard on office acoustics" »

Posted by Pierre Chigot at 10:02 PM | Permalink

Call centres are acoustically challenging environments. Australian/New Zealand Standard AS/NZS 2107:2000 "Recommended design sound levels and reverberation times for building interiors" addresses call centres.

Continue reading "Call centre room acoustics" »

Posted by Pierre Chigot at 11:49 AM | Permalink

Statskontoret Technical Standard TS 26:6 "Acoustical Noise Emission of Information Technology Equipment" specifies how to measure, declare and verify noise emission values of information technology equipment and also recommends acceptable upper limits for declared A-weighted sound power levels. Originally from Sweden it is widely used internationally when purchasing IT equipment.

Continue reading "TS 26:6 - noise from IT equipment" »

Posted by Pierre Chigot at 8:43 PM | Permalink

Mainstream media is more often reporting on the challenges of working in an open plan office. Danish newspapers and building industry periodicals address the problem by interviewing Bjørn Berthelsen from Ecophon Denmark.
Read the article

Contact

Posted by Fredrik at 3:46 PM | Permalink

Intrusive sounds, noise, make us tired and irritable. It has a negative effect on our performance, especially when working on tasks that depend on short-term memory. Noise in the office has a negative impact in three ways ... read more

Posted by at 11:28 PM | Permalink

The new Swedish Work Environment Authority’s Statute Book on Noise (AFS Buller, 2005:16) has recently been published, and will be valid starting 1st July 2005.
The Statute Book aims at supporting the new EU legislation on noise exposure of workers (2003/10/EG).
One of the main new items is that disturbing speech from others can be a problem.

Continue reading "Speech can be a source of disturbance at work" »

Posted by Fredrik at 11:13 AM | Permalink

Read the answer from the European Agency for Safety and Health at Work.

Posted by Fredrik at 12:36 AM | Permalink

“Effects of sound in offices: subjective experience vs objective assessment”

Author: Chigot Pierre
Source: Facilities, March 2005, vol. 23, no. 3-4, pp. 152-163(12)
Publisher: Emerald Group Publishing Limited

Read abstract>>

Posted by Fredrik at 1:34 PM | Permalink

Ecophon is supporting a research study conducted at Cardiff University, School of Psychology by Professor Dylan Jones and Dr Simon Banbury. The aim is to look at the effects of stress and anxiety on the disruption of tasks by office noise.

Continue reading "New research into the Effects of Noise" »

Posted by Fredrik at 9:06 AM | Permalink

The concept of speech privacy in offices relates to the degree of speech disturbance between two individuals who are not in conversation with each other. One is talking and the other one “happens to hear”:
* speech is intrusive since it is not useful to the listener (poor speech privacy = disturbance)
* speech of personal character is “leaking” from the speaker to surrounding workstations. (poor speech privacy = frustration)

Continue reading "To what extent does a ceiling contribute to privacy between work stations?" »

Posted by Fredrik at 10:44 AM | Permalink