Places
Quiet at the Office
Modern workplaces have traded offices with doors and privacy for open floor plans and collaboration. Unfortunately, this swap has invited more noise, dimmed our productivity, and killed our ability to get work done in quiet.
When people started working from home, they discovered there is a dimension of quiet in the day that was not there at the office. Now, as we look toward a hybrid work environment, we need to redefine the workplace and set the boundaries between talking and thinking. We need to re-introduce quiet. It’s the powerful ingredient that restores clear thinking.
Quiet at Home
Home has its own set of distractions. Co-workers call after hours, kids vie for our attention, emails continue to stream in, and phones constantly ping us with texts, news alerts, and notifications. The nonstop noise around us doesn’t abate, and the lines blur between our professional and personal lives.
People act as if staying connected is essential at every moment of the day and into the evening and weekends, but that simply isn’t true. We don’t need to be accessible all the time, no matter where we are. We’re overstimulated, and our brains crave quiet. We need time to think, rest, reflect, and recharge. Quiet works.
Quiet on the Go
We commute for work and travel for conferences and meetings. We’re always in cars, on planes, and checking into hotels. We can make all the excuses we want, but quiet deserves a dedicated time and place – even on the road.
Quiet can seem like a luxury, but it isn’t. Quiet is a non-negotiable appointment. Wherever we are, it’s less about technique and more about consistently making quiet happen. Put the phone down and close the laptop. We need to learn to say no to noise by saying yes to quiet, wherever we go.
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