[acb-hsp] Adjust Your Thermostat

[peter altschul]

Want More Productive Workers? Adjust Your Thermostat
  By Ron Friedman September 17, 2012
  If your office is a meat locker in the summer and a sauna in 
the winter, your employees' productivity and collaboration 
suffers--probably more than you think.
  Some years back, the Campbell Soup Company stumbled upon a 
marketing insight worthy of Don Draper.  If you want to predict 
when people will buy soup, the reasoning goes, you have to look 
beyond the product.  It's not about the depth of the soup's 
flavor, the color of its packaging or even its price.  In fact, 
it's hardly about Campbell's at all.  It's about the weather.
  Consumers buy more soup when conditions are cold, damp or 
windy.  The question facing Campbell's was this: How do you 
leverage this information into sales?
  So they did something brilliant.  They linked the frequency of 
their radio buys to the weather of each station.  To determine 
when ads would be purchased, they developed an algorithm called 
the "Misery Index," which uses meteorological data to track 
weather patterns.  To this day, if you're hearing an ad for soup 
on the radio, there's a good chance youbre either carrying an 
umbrella or wearing a coat.
  The rationale behind Campbell's Misery Index is simultaneously 
clever and obvious, a hallmark of game changing ideas.  But it 
also raises an interesting question.  If a drop in temperature 
changes what we buy, what does it do to the way we think?
  ininTyping With Gloves * If you sit near a vent, share legroom 
with a space heater, or use your desk to store outerwear, the 
question warrants serious consideration.  One of the painful 
ironies of office life is that we can never quite get the 
temperature right.  We spend our summers shivering in meat 
lockers and our winters sweating in saunas.
  Central air hasn't made us comfortable, so much as made us 
uncomfortable in a different way.
  The experience isn't simply unpleasant.  It comes with a real 
financial cost.
  To find out just how much, Cornell University researchers 
conducted a study that involved tinkering with the thermostat of 
an insurance office.  When temperatures were low (68 degrees, to 
be precise), employees committed 44% more errors and were less 
than half as productive as when temperatures were warm (a cozy 77 
degrees).
  Cold employees weren't just uncomfortable, they were 
distracted.  The drop in performance was costing employers 10% 
more per hour, per employee.  Which makes sense.  When our body's 
temperature drops, we expend energy keeping ourselves warm, 
making less energy available for concentration, inspiration and 
insight.
  ininFeeling Cold? You Might Just Be Lonely * And it's not just 
performance that dips.  It's our impression of the people around 
us.  In a fascinating study reported in the prestigious journal 
Science, psychologists uncovered a link between physical and 
interpersonal warmth.  When people feel cold physically, they're 
also more likely to perceive others as less generous and caring.
  In a word, they view them as cold.
  When we're warm, on the other hand, we let our guard down and 
view ourselves as more similar to those around us.  A forthcoming 
paper from researchers at UCLA even shows that brief exposure to 
warmer temperatures lead people to report higher job 
satisfaction.
  Why the link between physical and mental warmth?
  Psychologists argue it has to do with the way we're built.  The 
same area of the brain that lights up when we sense 
temperature--the insular cortex--is also active when we feel 
trust and empathy towards another person.  When we experience 
warmth, we experience trust.  And vice versa.
  Neurologically, it seems we have our wires crossed.  Except 
it's not a coincidence.
  There's a reason we associate warmth with trust, and it's 
because doing so promotes our survival, especially early on.  As 
infants, keeping close to our caretaker is vital to staying 
alive, which is one reason we're programmed to seek out warmth.  
Throughout our lives, we associate warmth (a hug) with affection 
(this person loves me).  It's a connection that grows stronger 
with every intimate embrace.
  ininWhy Lonely People Take More Showers * Because our minds 
unconsciously link warmth with affection, we're more sensitive to 
cold temperatures than we think.
  Research shows that when we experience cold temperatures, we're 
especially likely to feel isolated.  In fact, countering the 
experience of isolation is one reason people spend more time in 
the shower when they're feeling down.
  The unconscious desire for physical warmth is thought to be the 
reason lonely people bathe longer, more frequently, and using 
higher temperatures.
  ininThe Warmth-Productivity Link * We know that cold 
temperatures worsen productivity.  What new research is showing 
is that it can also corrode the quality of our relationships.
  And this, ultimately, is why office temperature matters.
  Great workplaces aren't simply the product of good 
organizational policies.  They emerge when employees connect with 
one another and form meaningful relationships that engender 
trust.  What's often overlooked is that connections don't operate 
in a vacuum.
  It seems obvious that the temperature of a restaurant or 
theatre can alter our experience.  So why do we continue to 
neglect it in the workplace?
  Copyright B) 2012 Mansueto Ventures LLC.  All rights reserved.