For those who are new to the term, "highly sensitive person," it was
coined by psychologist and personality researcher Elaine Aron to
describe a trait found in up to 20 percent of the population. People in
this group react distinctly to their environments, both inner and
outer. They tend to have a heightened awareness of emotions and respond
more intensely to loud noises and other sensory stimuli. They also
exhibit distinct patterns in the way they think and work. They are
especially imaginative and have a tendency toward what Aron calls “deep
processing” of information. HSPs tend to be conscientious, loyal, good
at catching mistakes, and committed to high performance. (Take the
online test to find out if you are an HSP.)
The
good news is that HSPs are extremely valuable workers, contributing
their intuition, wise counsel, conscientiousness, and creativity across a
broad range of industries and professions. The bad new is that today’s
typical office setup is completely at odds with their working and
thinking styles. HSPs typically need quiet and calm, and do their best
work when they can plunge into a task without interruption. They tend to
be uncomfortable being watched and don’t like being drawn into office
politics. They need downtime and they can become especially distracted
if they are physically uncomfortable at work.
Unfortunately, in
today's work environment, employees are expected to tolerate noise, be
good at multi-tasking, enjoy meetings, excel in networking, tolerate
long hours under florescent lights, and thrive working in teams that sit
face to face much of the day. The International Management Facility
Association estimates that 70 percent of American employees work in
open-plan environments — what used to be called “bullpens.” These
layouts are designed to maximize space, minimize cost and reduce or even
eliminate private spaces or offices. Basically, it’s goodbye doors and
walls. Hello cubicle and group workstation.
Research
shows that open-plan offices carry a number of risks that cost both
employers and employees, including more bickering and conflict, high
blood pressure, stress, plummeting productivity, and high turnover. The
noise alone is a huge challenge: As a Cornell University study has
pointed out, noise is the
number one complaint of office workers, and numerous researchers have shown that the sound levels in open-plan offices can reduce productivity by
as much as 66 percent.
It
doesn’t take much. Even a conversation at normal decibels is enough to
short-circuit the attention. Many workers in open-plan offices feel
surveilled, unsatisfied, unable to concentrate, and constantly
distracted.
Undoubtedly there are some people who thrive and feel
energized by open floorplans — lucky them! But many people find them
difficult, and for HSPs, they are close to intolerable. The noise
problem alone, which Aron calls the “
bane of the HSP’s existence,”
is often enough to seriously impact their performance. The stress of
these office spaces, which combined with long hours and the need to be
“on” and available outside of work hours, can create a state of constant
overstimulation, as if their bodies and minds are set on a single
fight-or-flight channel.
If 70 percent of people work in open
floorplans, and one out of five of those people is an HSP, what you’ve
got is a recipe for skyrocketing anxiety, productivity ground to a
screeching halt, and a host of other problems that can be quite
dangerous. Feeling helpless to change their office environment, HSPs
with jangled nerves may find themselves heading to the psychiatrist’s
office, seeking to alter their internal state, which, in the case of an
innate trait that is
likely genetically coded,
can be a fool’s errand. Muscles tense and head pounding from
over-arousal, some HSPs may reach for something — anything — that seems
soothing, like a cocktail or prescription pain medication.
There
are probably deep cultural roots in the expectations of American office
behavior and performance so contrary to HSP needs. As Aron notes in her
book,
The Highly Sensitive Person, Western cultures tends to
divide people into two classes, “the tough warriors and kings on the one
hand and the more thoughtful, learned priests, judges, and royal
advisors on the other.” HSPs, as you might guess, are overrepresented in
the latter class, but American work culture tends to favor the first
sort. Societies need a balance between these two types, and so do work
communities, but this point is lost on employers who insist on a
one-size-fits-all office environment that penalizes HSPs for their
natural tendencies—and gifts.
A conflict with an employer over the
work environment can be especially daunting for an HSP. Many are
people-pleasers, and it can be a struggle to recognize, much less
defend, their own needs. They may not like to ask for things, and when
the larger culture’s prejudices enforce the notion that an employee
should behave and work a certain way, it’s very difficult for HSPs not
to see themselves as flawed when they don’t fit that mold. Ideas about
how employees should operate also play into gender prejudices.
Sensitivity is coded female in a negative way, so when a woman acts like
an HSP, she is dismissed as typically female, or worse, hormonal. Men
with the trait are seen as abnormal and “sissies.”
I’m an HSP, and
I’ll never forget the awful day when a new manager at the organization
where I was employed called me into his office to announce certain
changes. I would be removed from the small office with a door where I
did my writing and editing work. Our entire office would be turned into
an open floorplan with rows of desks arranged without dividers to
“facilitate teamwork and innovation.” That news hit me like a sock in
the gut. I could imagine exactly how it would be: the sounds of phones
ringing, constant interruptions, trying to blot out the cacophony with
noise-canceling headphones. I had experienced this type of work
environment before and I knew the result for me: blinding headaches,
stress and declining performance.
Not only was this new manager
completely set with his plan, dismissive of any objections, and
uninterested in options like working from home or organizing the space
differently, I could also see he was going to penalize me for not
complying. Because I was a valuable employee with a high performance
record, I was able to take the risk of fighting back. In the end, I took
a gamble and I reminded this manager that he might have liability
exposure if he forced me to work under conditions that would cause
serious stress (don’t do this without consulting a lawyer!). Luckily for
me, it worked. I got to keep my office, but the manager resented it
deeply, so it was hardly an ideal outcome. If I had been lower on the
totem pole in my office, I might have fared worse.
Now that I have
more information about HSPs and have seen research on the negative
impacts of open floorplans and cubicles, I make my case differently
today. I try to avoid getting into an “I’m right, you’re wrong” kind of
debate that will cause an employer to lose face if I am accommodated. I
seek instead to present information that opens up as many possibilities
and options as I can. I try to state my case in a way that is both
self-assured and respectful. I aim to convey that I want to do excellent
work for my employer, and seek to set up conditions that are mutually
beneficial. Sometimes that means a trial period of working from home, a
part-time contract, or a schedule that brings me to the office only at
certain times. None of this is easy, and the process of getting the
point across can be maddeningly slow and difficult. You really have to
demonstrate top-notch work and extra commitment to the job. Sometimes
you have to find a different employer or take the risk of being
self-employed. When you have rent to pay and mouths to feed, such a
dilemma can feel insurmountable. But when you think about the risks, you
have to consider the impact on your health, and to your performance,
which, if it declines, may well send you packing anyway.
If you’re
not able to get out of the open floorplan for the entire day, see if
you can negotiate a private space for a couple of dedicated hours a day.
For another option, sound consultant Julian Treasure recommends wearing
headphones with sounds like birdsong playing. That doesn’t work for me,
as I find even the birdsong piped into my ears distracting. But it may
help others. I can find some improvement wearing earplugs, although if
the conversations and phones are too close, earplugs may not do the job.
Plus, they can be uncomfortable for long periods of time, day after
day.
To
improve work life in America, we often focus our energies on things
like raising the minimum wage. This is certainly important, but it’s not
just the compensation for our work that matters. The quality and
conditions of our workplaces allow us to thrive as human beings. The
individual solutions will probably only go so far, and many of the
cultural trends seem to be moving in the wrong direction for HSPs, which
will end up hurting everyone. As Aron writes, “As the world becomes
more difficult and stimulating, it is natural for the non-HSPs to
thrive, at least at first. But they will not thrive long without us.”
There are signs of pushback. Lindsey Kaufman’s
recent article in the
Washington Post,
“Google got it wrong. The open-office trend is destroying the
workplace,” was widely shared on social media. Kaufman, who works in the
advertising industry, described her reaction to her boss’s announcement
of an open floorplan in a way HSPs everywhere can relate to: “After
nine years as a senior writer, I was forced to trade in my private
office for a seat at a long, shared table. It felt like my boss had
ripped off my clothes and left me standing in my skivvies.”
In a
New Yorker piece
from January 2014, Maria Konnikova gave a stinging indictment of the
harm inflicted by open floorplans and their tendency to destroy the very
things they have been touted to foster — teamwork and innovation, while
promoting absenteeism and dissatisfaction. Her article surfaces
research showing that the idea that younger people better tolerate open
floorplan conditions is mostly bunk.
One thing is certain: our
well being, both economically and socially, depends on an outcome in
which at least one fifth of the American office population is not
consigned to hell. HSPs of the world, unite!
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