An untidy office is good for you
Dr. Craig Knight
Director @ IDR | Chartered Psychologist (Organizational) , Registered Occupational Psychologist
“Some things in life are bad
They can really make you mad
Other things just make you swear and curse…”
(Eric Idle)
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Clever but misapplied
It is difficult to look on the bright side of life when there is badly applied research, wherever it comes from. Have a look at this from Stanford (yep).
“A clean, well-lighted place
How less clutter can reduce stress” (Link at bottom)
?“Down with this Sort of Thing”, to quote Father Ted, another modern sage, . Ridding workspaces of “clutter” is at the heart of the most insidious working practices. The imposition of a clean, sparkling space is at the root of what Baldry, Bain and Taylor (1998) called “Bright Satanic Offices”
Stanford should hang its head.?
And yet, the article is absolutely correct. Clutter can increase stress, working in clutter is bad for us, a topsy turvy working environment does nobody any good.
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What is clutter?
However, stuff lying about on desks and sundry articles around the workspace is not the same things as clutter. Not at all.? ‘Clutter’ should not be defined as extraneous stuff, or as 'something unnecessary to the process of the business to hand'. If it is, we drive down the spick and span hell road that leads to Lean and Six Sigma, which shares the article’s implication that only the swept and the shiny will do. “Look there is an apple on the desk, a pile of papers on that pedestal, some photographs of a holiday…all clutter, bin them.”
There is a level of mess, up with which any one of us will not put. But that level varies for everybody. For you, perhaps a stray paper clip on the melamine is sufficient to drive you into paroxysms of angst. The sight of anything out of place causes your palms to fly to your temples , your jaw to slackens and your sad eyes to sink in slow misery, like coals in wet mud.
The Vulcan desk
Yet other people work quite happily surrounded by piles of paper; they balance old teacups and have a ratty collection of ballpoints that stopped working when Laszlo Biro smudged has last line. Indeed there is thing called the caldera desk where the worker sits in a darkening hollow as a conical wall of apparent detritus piles up around them.
It is very easy to show how inefficient the caldera desk is. Ask the occupant for the memo on Fire Extinguishers? from last February and they will be scrabbling like fingerbobs lost in scree for about an hour. Meanwhile your spotless desk inhabitant will reach into the filing drawer and retrieve the memo within a minute or two.
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But then ask each for copies of what they are working on, and the results are very different. Everything is within easy reach for the caldera builder - which is usually an ergonomic delight of efficient movement - not filed in a drawer somewhere.
“What about security?” you ask. Good question. Glad you mentioned that.
Imagine you are a thief and looking for something. What is the easiest steal? One from inside a desk neatly filed in obvious patterns protected by the massively secure locks desks tend to have. Or a convoluted pile of stuff, that makes no sense to anybody except the owner?
Aaaagh! I can't stand it anymore
A caldera owner, happy with their lot, is as at home in a desk that has been decluttered to Stanford prescription, as the trembling tidy-naut would be working inside an unstable paper mountain. The time will come when even the most ardent desktop topographer will look at that last playing card or see the plastic koala skating unbidden down the steep, wood pulp slope yet again and issue a scream akin to that of the owner of the wandering paperclip (above). Then expect to see cans of Pledge and enough elbow grease to lubricate a tank.? Clutter has been perceived by the space inhabitant and to stay within its bounds is unhealthy. But it was far from unhealthy until that point.? Our clutter perception levels vary massively.
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It's the (expletive) science
The science is unequivocal, imposing somebody else’s idea of a clutter free existence on people is worse, considerably worse, than having everybody working in a bit of a mess.? Now Stanford are, of course a brilliant establishment, but nobody's perfect. It was Stanford who hosted and promoted the frankly misleading research that was Zimbardo’s prisoner experiment. ? If they want to do something good and meaningful within the workspace, I am here and would love to play.
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To say that having ‘stuff’ lying about is a bad thing, and that a clean scrubbed space is somehow virtuous and healthy, is not just wrong, it is dangerous. It encourages sterile business landscapes that harm wellbeing, esprit de corps, health and productivity.? So as we close, let us commend the favourite aphorism of perhaps the greatest modern-day sage of all, Sir Billy Connolly, to anybody considering a stark, clutter-free space “**** off! Just **** off.” (Thanks Billy)
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References
Baldry, C., Bain, P., & Taylor, P. (1998). ‘Bright satanic offices’: Intensification, control and team Taylorism’ In P. Thompson & C. Warhurst, (Eds.) Workplaces of the future (pp.163-183). Basingstoke: Macmillan.
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Be Well, Stanford (2023) ‘A clean well lighted place: How less clutter can reduce stress, retrieved 10th October 2023 from https://bewell.stanford.edu/a-clean-well-lighted-place/
Photographs
?Billy Connolly by Fuck (film) director Steve Anderson (director) is the sole owner of the exclusive copyright of the image. - Provided by Steve Anderson (director), CC BY-SA 3.0, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?curid=68239262
Eric idle By PythonProfessor - Own work, CC BY-SA 4.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=127344167
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Business Development at Kinnarps, Founder of Questae Collective, & Mental Health Swims host
1 年For me, I start tidy, create the chaos that works for me, I revel in it, thrive in it, create in it, do what I need to do to the best of my ability, in my space as I like it...but then I leave tidy (& white clove clean) at the end...
If you're lost in a maze of digital changes I can guide you out???| Change and Comms Specialist ??| Podcast Host ??
1 年Dr. Craig Knight it's been a while but I'd like you to know you are still my first thought / line of mental defence when I survey the chaotic environment around me! Current items on my desk include a flute, ant spray, sellotape and tape measurer. Wonder what that says about me. Hope all is well.
Business Development Manager, UK
1 年So true! And a clean desk may or may not help some of those creatives which everyone says they need, or those neurodiverse personages, or loads of peeps! I’ll never forget some super-billionaire stating that people should wear the same thing every day because, “…you can only make so many decisions in a day, so save it for the important ones.” I just thought he was boring with no sense of style myself - LOL! But then again, I’m not struggling with the weight of being a super billionaire…
???????Artist ??Idea maker ?? Entrepreneur ??Adventurer
1 年It’s pretty insightful and many times a person’s desk works like an extension of their self and mindspace. And imposing an order or disorder in one’s personal mind space is counterproductive. Desk order might be a small thing in the whole system of the company but it directly is resultant of the culture in the company and the way people in it work and feel.