Office Soundproofing | The 3 most common issues

In our last blog entry ‘Open Plan Office Spaces and Reverberation Issues‘ we looked at how Reverberation can affect open-plan office spaces and lack of clarity in speech. In this entry, we are looking at how office soundproofing between walls can help your privacy and productivity.

“If you can hear someone talking while you’re reading or writing, your productivity dips by up to 66%.

Open floor-plan offices distract workers without them even noticing it. In a classic study published in the British Journal of Psychology in 1998, researchers found that employers were highly distracted when they could hear the conversation around them, and less able to perform their duties. Another classic study found that noise in the office also correlated to increased stress hormone levels and a lower willingness to engage with others. According to Sound Agency case study, when sound masking technology was used in an office, there was a 46% improvement in employees’ ability to concentrate and their short-term memory accuracy increased by 10 percent.”

Office Soundproofing issue #1 – Lightweight Building Materials

Offices are most commonly built with cheaper materials than residential structures given that there are few Building Regulations set in for commercial units between internal spaces – this can usually be the most immediate area that needs addressing by replacement of current plasterboards with new systems, we will look at potential solutions below.

The Solution

If lightweight building materials are causing you to hear unwanted noise you can install a MuteClip or MuteBoard System. If you are struggliing wiht nosie from floors above or below we also have systems that can help with that.

MuteClip Systems

MuteClip systems are the most effective soundproofing we offer. The simpiest way of thinking about this method of office soundproofing is building a new slimline wall that is connected to the existing wall with many mini shock absorbers. This offers incredible soundproofing results.

MuteBoard systems

MuteBoard systems are direct to wall soundproofing panels that can be installed quickly and easily. There are different make-ups of soundproof panels but all of ours are finished with a layer of acoustic plasterboard meaning they have a perfect wall finish whilst offering excellent soundproofing.

Suspended ceiling tiles are used in most offices where a lesser ceiling height is desired, essentially this is a metal grid system fixed into the structural ceiling above to cover a large area. One of the most common issues is that partition walls throughout the office space are built only up to the metal gridding which leave an expansive void above all spaces, so as an example; when a call centre space, managing director space and a meeting room space are all adjacent – these sounds will continue to leak over the top of the partition freely.

The Solution

Extending the partition through the dropped ceiling with soundprooinf materials like acoustic mineral wool and Tecsound can help reduce transference but the ebst option would be to replace your ceiling tiles with acoustic ceiling tiles. These tiles have great absorbtion qualities and can make your office less echoey.

Office Soundproofing issue #3 – Internal Flanking Through Partitioning

Much like Suspended Ceiling Tiles, this is through internal partitioning that is created through stud framing that create multiple spaces between layers of plasterboard, so if somebody is in an adjacent office there will most likely be sounds travelling down adjacent walls if these are not treated.

The Solution

The best treatment for this kind of flanking sound is to install acoustic mineral wool in to the existing stud frame.