Managers and busybodies in the office like to harp about the virtues of tidy desks, but according to some new research, such thinking may be outdated.
According to a recent paper in the Journal of Consumer Research, messy desks may in fact boost workplace productivity by promoting clearer thinking.
“Messy desks may not be as detrimental as they appear to be, as the problem-solving approaches they seem to cause can boost work efficiency or enhance employees’ creativity in problem solving,” said authors Jia Liu (University of Groningen), Dirk Smeesters (Erasmus University) and Debra Trampe (University of Groningen).
In a series of studies, the authors found that people actually thought more clearly in a disorganised and chaotic setting as they sought to simplify the tasks at hand.
“Business and government managers often promote ‘clean desk’ policies to avoid disorganised offices and messy desks, for the purpose of boosting work efficiency and productivity,” said Jia Liu.
Jia pointed out that such practices are based on conventional wisdom that a messy environment can clutter one’s mind and complicate judgments. Not all evidence supports the link between a messy environment and a messy mind, he added.
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