Office noise bothers some people more than others
I currently work for a startup and all three of us are hotdesking. We're constantly moved to new spaces in the hotdesking space because a new company is leaving/moving in. I've sat beside recruiters, property managers and salespeople.There's no "quiet" room. The meeting rooms cost a few hundred and need to be pre-booked.
My home environment isn't a quiet refuge either. Beside a busy street, more flatmates than their should be and a room beside the kitchen which is used late in the night.The only quiet I can wrangle is a few hours at a local library on weekends before the kids come in for the reading and writing sessions.The noise has gotten bad enough that I'm considering quitting my job and running away to a small town.Yes, you can use noise cancelling headphones but:1. They're uncomfortable for long periods2. They don't really block all the noise and you live in anxiety waiting for that one blaring ringtone to squeeze through3. I find it difficult to concentrate with them on. It feels like a heavy, constricting object squeezing my temples.No solutions, just a rant.EDIT: Thinking about it some more on the transit to work this morning. I believe the constant battering to my senses has made me more irritable. I tend to avoid my flatmates and reply with dismissive grunts and hand waves. Ditto for people in the shared space. Small things upset me even more. A failed build pipeline or a new Jira request will infuriate me. I've been countering this with more breaks from the screen to take walks around the office block.