Let’s be honest, we all face those frequent and nagging interruptions at work. The most nagging one of all is when your colleague stands by your desk towering over you or waves from their end of the cubicle asking “are you on the phone?” At this point you often try and appear busier than you are, unless you are a polite soul who prefers to smile, nod and point to that headset of yours indicating that you are indeed busy on the phone.
A simple and non-offensive solution that lets you advise people that you are busy is the Kuando Busylight. Our customers love them and we love them! Here is a great article about Busylight via Bloomberg Business.
Ah, the open office plan: a haven for creativity, spontaneity, and collaboration. If you’ve ever worked in one, you probably know these as code words for ceaseless noise, distractions, and being forced to listen to phone calls about the veterinary issues of your co-workers’ cats.
And the research backs this up: Studies show that open offices can hurt productivity and lead to dissatisfied employees. (That’s a lose-lose, in case you’re keeping track.)
So it should be no surprise that workers faced with unfortunate office architecture have come up with creative ways to cope. Friends of mine report doing everything from hanging silk flowers from their desk to signal when they are busy to conspiring with co-workers to call them any time they see a potential interruptor approaching.
“I’ve talked to offices who have told me: ‘We’re using red Solo cups and green Solo cups to let people know when we’re busy or available,’ ” says Mitch Friend, business development manager at Denmark-based Plenom. “The problem is, nobody ever remembers to change these things. If it’s not automatic, it doesn’t work.”
To fix this, Plenom sells a device called the Kuando Busylight. The light-up LED beacon attaches to the top of a monitor or cubicle wall and changes from red to green to let passersby know whether they should leave you alone. It syncs up with Microsoft’s Lync and Skype for Business software and automatically adjusts its coloUr based on your status in the messaging program. So if your Skype is set to “Busy,” your Busylight automatically flips to red, and so on.
It works well for avoiding distractions, says Andrew Wadsworth, a technologist at the University of Illinois who has used the device for the past two years. “As soon as people see the little light, they know I’m busy,” he says. “A lot of people here talk without headsets or listen to music through headsets. So without this, it’s really hard to tell if somebody’s busy or on a call without interrupting them to ask.”
Busylight connects to a computer via USB and also comes in configurations for folks who don’t use Skype for Business. It can also serve as a signal for incoming calls—if you see it flash, you know to run back to your desk.
To order Busylight for your team, contact Michael Elliman
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