I put my personal phone on silent/vibrate when sit down at my desk every morning. Have something you can listen to on headphones and work to as needed – classical guitar & Hamilton are my go tos. 
My pet peeve is people who use speaker phones in an open seating area. Get a room, people!
I really, really hated working in a cubicle. Too distracting. Too much of people minding each other’s business. Whoever dreamed up the idea in the first place was nuts, IMHO.
I once started a new job shortly before we bought a house and moved. I had sort of a hybrid arrangement where I was paid by the hour but had some regular benefits: 401K, but not health insurance. Anyway, I kept careful track of my time, and during the period of buying a house, when I had to talk to agents, banks, etc I did not take lunch, instead using the time for those calls. Some sneaky jerks went to my boss and complained that I was on the phone too much! She knew what I was soing, and that I was scrupulous about my time, but it was very unpleasant to feel as if people were spying on me.
One of the best things about being a manager was having an actual OFFICE with a door! The people who reported to me were all writers and editors. The cubicles and multi-person room arrangements made it very hard for them to concentrate. It is especially bad if people like writers are placed next to people like customer service, who need to be on the phone all the time, or near the art department, who can easily work and talk at the same time. Just stinks.
Open office environments are noisy. You either learn to tune out your coworker’s conservations as background noise or invest in a pair of noise cancelling headphones. Bose makes great noise cancelling headphones.
Curious - if you have an office with a door - and no windows to the hallway - what % of the time do you fully close the door? I’m in an office now (LOVE!) and I leave it open most of the time but will shut it for conference calls, personal calls. I will shut it 3/4 of the way when I’m eating at my desk (most of the time) or when it happens to be louder in the hallway area and I need to concentrate.
I used to shut my door for business calls, for conferences with people who reported to me, for interviews of prospective hires, and basically anything requiring privacy. When I was reviewing manuscripts and the like, I left it ajar so that people could feel free to interrupt me.
I spent a fair amount of time interviewing users when I was a writer. I used conference rooms for that.
I always leave my door open unless I was having a private conference call or meeting (personnel related).
Few years ago I worked at a place where only very senior people had offices. In the beginning it felt strange to me (or a bit PO) after years of having an office, but I found it to be very conducive for collaboration when we were doing development work. People would just stand up if they got stuck on a problem. We got a lot of work done very quickly.
Two companies ago, I was in a cubicle environment where the walls were so low you could see everyone on the entire floor when seated. It was horribly noisy, and just horrible in general. Every time someone stood up it was distracting. My manager sat in the cube behind me and could watch what I did every second of the day if he wanted to. It’s dehumanizing.
There are some companies that don’t even have cubes, just long tables where everyone sits. So it could be worse…
Headphones will be your salvation. Hopefully your company lets you stream music or use spotify or something similar, or you might have to dig out your iPod.
Fortunately my building has an actual cafeteria, so we don’t have to eat at our desks. Some people still do though… and if you microwave fish and eat it at your desk you will not have happy coworkers.
@notrichenough, my client recently went to the “tables for everyone” model. Even directors sit in those configurations. It is pretty widely loathed by almost everyone about 2 months after the change.
I worked for a company that had the long workbench style work areas. I stuck it out for 6 months. Of course there were other reasons I left but that didn’t help.
Be mindful that shared quiet areas are indeed shared. Last week an employee from another location decided to “camp out” in our office’s small “phone room” with his laptop. I finally ended up being the one who called him out on it (we have several empty cubicles as well as drop in workstations.
I once worked with a guy who made noise eating a BANANA!
I agree one shouldn’t clip one’s nails in an office cubicle. But I do love conference calls from home – that’s when I give myself a manicure!
I had an office mate who would clip his nails every couple of days. His nails must have grown fast! And he drank coffee really loudly. Big slurrrrp . . . then an exhaled “Aaaah!”
I am usually a very kind person who doesn’t speak badly about others, but he tried my good nature.
I had one cubicle neighbor years ago who spoke English to clients and coworkers but once a day during lunch would talk nonstop very fast for an hour in her native language. It was hard to concentrate, which was strange because I couldn’t understand a word she said, but I think it was the nonstop chatter that broke my concentration.
When my company went to that long table arrangement, my lovely boss told everyone in our group to work at home until he could find a more humane solution. Three weeks later, he told us that anyone who didn’t want to work at home any longer could have a private office in one of the sales locations not far from the facility with the table arrangement. About half of us stayed home and the other half opted for the sales location. I miss that guy.
I remember a picture of my Grandfather at his job. He was sitting at his desk in his white short sleeved shirt and tie. His desk was one of many in a row in the middle of a wide open space. When I first started working, I was in a cube and since I didn’t know any better, I didn’t really mind. I later worked where we all had cubes but with low walls so I could see all the way to the end of the building. A bit noisier but still didn’t mind.
Fast forward and for the past 15 years I’ve been in an office. I usually always keep my door open unless I am in a 1x1 meeting with one of my employee’s or if I’m on a conference call. I eat at my desk almost every day but usually just a yogurt or sandwich, nothing that would stink up the building.
My biggest pet peeve with cube life was when I was working on something and then the person next to me would have visitors and they would be talking about what they watched on TV last night, or some other off topic. If they were working it didn’t bother me but when I could hear them goofing off it would bug me. Not that they were louder but just a basic work ethic issue. Guess that’s why I moved up the chain and they didn’t.
The main complaints I deal with from my ee’s in cubes is usually around noise from people goofing off, smells from someone that might have on too much perfume/cologne or hand lotion, and then unwanted visitors. I did once get a complaint about some decorations one ee had up and then every once in a while we’ll get a complaint around plants. Most people in my office just use basic common sense and we don’t get a lot of complaints.
I sat on the trading floor when I was younger. I would hear about people’s evening/weekend escapades and detailed medical issues. One in particular was a guy talking to his doctor about why his wife wasn’t getting pregnant and what they could do about it. Just TMI.
People eating at their desk never really bothered me.
I used to get grossed out when people were sick, coughing and blowing their nose.
Why on earth would an organization go to long tables? I could see it if everyone were engaged in a physical task. When I’m working with my hands–cooking, making truffles, crafts, sorting stuff, preparing political mailings, etc–I really enjoy having other people working with me to talk to, and if I don’t I can’t live without audiobooks or podcasts. But if I am doing a mental task, like reading or writing or coding, it is bad to have distractions all around. If you are sitting within earshot of 15 or more people, and each of them has one or two conversations per day, whether work-related or not, in person or on the phone, that means that there is constant talking going on.
Cubicles were bad enough. What bright bulb came up with this table idea?
Some things I learned from my cubicle neighbor:
He takes Levitra
He snores and has sleep apnea
Each mouthful of apple consists of three bites
He slurps his 3 cokes/day through a straw
He calls his wife shoog and sugar
He eats fun-size candy bars about every hour
Great guy, but cubicle life is more intimate than I would like.
At least now we all have cell phones so if you want to make a private call you can walk away from your desk. It was a lot tougher back in the day.
Then there’s when some power-tripping manager or HR person will become the “cubicle king” and try to impose all kinds of crazy rules like:
There are plenty of ergonomic studies that show that cubes are very inefficient, if not counter-productive, for workers who need to concentrate on their work, but none of that ever trumps the bottom line.