Each year at Derby University the IOA Midlands Branch and Derby acoustics students gather to listen to presentations from the previous year’s projects.
This year via Zoom we welcome recent MSc Applied Acoustics student Michel Batista.
Presentation Overview
Work environments continually evolve. In recent years we have seen a shift from enclosed offices to contemporary open-plan layouts with fixed workstations and activity-based spaces that afford employees the benefit of interchanging work activities between open-plan workstation layouts, collaboration ̶ and private areas. Despite the global trend suggesting open-plan offices promote collaborative work spaces, improve social relations, communication and sharing of knowledge between employees, distracting noises caused by irrelevant speech and lack of speech privacy are typical problems associated with such spaces. Released in 2012, the ISO 3382-3 standard is currently the only international measure of recommended room acoustic target values designers can reference for open-plan offices. However, this standard is rendered ineffectual as limited information is available to an acoustic designer when planning multi-functional office spaces with individual and collaborative contexts.
Michel Batista is presenting a discussion on two case studies examining the subjective impressions of employees working in two open-plan offices. In addition to investigating future trends of open-plan office environments his inquiry focuses on the limitations of ISO 3382-3 acoustic target values creating challenges for acousticians designing for such spaces.
The event is free to members of the IOA and the public.
Please register for the event at: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/the-challenges-facing-acousticians-designing-for-open-plan-offices-tickets-121280596529.
Joining details have been sent to all Midlands Branch members and will also be circulated by 12pm on the day of the event to those registered via Eventbrite.
CPD certificates will be available to those who request them. If you have any queries, please contact ioamidlands@ioa.org.uk.