Add Some Wood to Your Home Office to Boost Focus and Job Satisfaction
It has been almost a year since people working in the office were ordered to work from home until the pandemic passes. First of all, we must start by saying that even being able to do this is a huge privilege: so many important workers keep commuting to work and facing the public every day, and they don’t have the opportunity to stay at home.
But for those who do it, it can be difficult to focus on their work during the day due to the many other things to do. Or maybe someone who once enjoyed the job now finds it boring and tedious, especially since the best parts of the day were secret conversations with coworkers. Either way, one thing that can help make your home office a little less awful is to add some woody touches. Here’s what you need to know.
How to incorporate a tree into a home office
If you weren’t one of those lucky ones who were able to escape the city or the suburbs and move into some quaint hut in the woods during the pandemic, you probably at least thought about it (and envied those who could. If you already don’t live in a cabin in the woods). But what if you could bring some wood … to you. This was the main premise of a 2018 Australian study that examined the impact of wood use in the office.
Whereas this is not any scientific study, the survey results did point to the fact that people said they had a more pleasant and satisfying work experience when they could see “natural looking wooden objects” from their workers. stations. including desks, tables, doors, beams and panels:
“Satisfaction with both working life and the physical workplace is growing steadily with the proportion of natural looking wood surfaces. People in workplaces with less than 20% natural wood surfaces are much less satisfied with both their work activity and the physical workplace compared to those with a large proportion of wood. “
In addition, survey participants who worked in areas with more unprotected timber reported higher scores for their personal productivity, ability to concentrate, and overall mood.
Will your workday make your workday more enjoyable by adding wood elements to your home office? You will have to judge this.
As Treehugger ‘s Lloyd Alter writes of the survey, “The idea that replacing the desk and door frame with wood trim can make such a big difference is amazing.”
While at the same time, Alter notes , “This study demonstrates that people love wood and think they are better at it, demonstrating that the benefits of wood construction really go beyond simple carbon savings.”
So if you’re choosing between office accessories made of wood (or something that should look like wood), these survey results might be something to consider.