Open-plan offices make it easier for people to connect and collaborate, but they come with a well-known trade-off: noise. Conversations, phone and video calls, and general activity can make it hard to concentrate. The good news is that you don't always need major building work to improve things. With the right layout, furniture and a few simple policies, you can make an open-plan workplace noticeably calmer.
Why open-plan offices get noisy
Sound travels easily across large open spaces with hard surfaces. Concrete floors, glass walls, exposed ceilings and hard desks all reflect sound rather than absorb it, so noise bounces around the room. Speech is especially distracting because our brains are tuned to pick out words, which is why a nearby conversation can be harder to ignore than general background hum.
The ABC approach: absorb, block, cover
Acoustic design is often summarised as three strategies:
- Absorb: use soft, sound-absorbing materials to reduce reflected sound and echo.
- Block: put physical barriers between noise sources and the people trying to concentrate.
- Cover: use background sound to make speech less intelligible (this is usually handled by specialist sound masking systems).
Office furniture can help a lot with the first two.
1. Zone your space
One of the most effective steps costs very little: plan your layout so noisy and quiet activities aren't side by side. Group collaborative teams, kitchens, printers and breakout areas together, and keep focused-work areas further away. Clear zones also help set expectations about how people behave in each space.
2. Use screens and partitions to divide areas
Freestanding screens break up long sightlines and interrupt the path sound travels across a room. They're also easy to reposition when your layout changes. Options include the Divide Floor Standing Screen and Cascade Screens. For a natural look, a Planter Wall divides space while bringing greenery into the office, and Bruna Shelving can act as a room divider with storage and display.
3. Add absorption overhead and on walls
Ceilings and walls are large surfaces, so treating them can make a big difference to echo. Hanging panels such as Boyd Hanging Carved Panels divide space from above and add a design feature without taking up floor area.
4. Give people somewhere to go
No matter how well you treat an open-plan space, people still need places for private calls, video meetings and deep focus. Office pods provide an enclosed space within the open plan, so a conversation doesn't disturb the people around it. See our Focus Office Pods. Small meeting rooms and quiet rooms, furnished with a meeting table and comfortable chairs, serve a similar purpose.
5. Use soft furnishings
Upholstered furniture absorbs some sound compared with hard surfaces. Breakout areas furnished with soft seating such as modular sofas and lounges can feel more comfortable to use and help soften the space, especially alongside rugs and other soft finishes.
6. Think about desk layout
Small layout decisions help too. Avoid long, unbroken rows of desks facing each other where possible, and consider placing storage units, such as lockers and cupboards, between groups of desks to act as a buffer.
7. Agree on simple etiquette
Furniture works best alongside a few shared habits:
- Take long calls and video meetings in pods or meeting rooms.
- Use headphones for calls and media at the desk.
- Keep impromptu group discussions to collaborative zones.
- Agree on quiet areas or quiet times for focused work.
8. Plan for hybrid work
Hybrid working has changed how many offices are used. When people come in mainly to meet and collaborate, there are often more conversations and video calls happening at once. That makes it even more important to provide a mix of spaces: open collaborative areas, enclosed spaces for calls and quieter desks for focused work. Flexible furniture, such as movable screens and a Mobile Whiteboard, lets you reconfigure areas as patterns of use change, and smart lockers help keep shared desks clear so people can choose the right spot for the task at hand.
Measure and review
After making changes, check in with your team again. Ask whether it's easier to concentrate, whether people can find somewhere to take calls, and whether any new hotspots have appeared. Acoustics is rarely solved in one step, and small adjustments to layout and furniture over time often deliver the best results.
Start with the biggest problems
You don't need to do everything at once. Talk to your team about what bothers them most, notice where noise tends to build up, and start there. Often a combination of better zoning, a few well-placed screens and a pod or quiet room for calls makes a real difference. For larger or more complex spaces, an acoustic consultant can assess your building and recommend specific treatments.
Office acoustic solutions in NZ
Browse our Acoustics collection and our Partitions & Pods range for screens, panels, planter walls and office pods. We deliver NZ-wide, and all prices are shown excluding GST. If you'd like help planning a quieter workplace, contact Focus Office Furniture and we'll talk through your space.
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