中文导读 许多公司希望员工多回办公室，于是花钱添置新家具、绿植和明亮的公共区域。但一份覆盖全球一万多个办公场所的新报告提醒：最基本的噪音问题往往没被解决。文章先用数据说明噪音有多重要、满意的人有多少；再比较噪音处理得好的办公室和差的办公室，指出关键不在独立办公室或降噪耳机，而在于能让人“躲开”噪音的安静空间；接着说明噪音对部分员工影响更大，以及办公改造为何不一定带来改善；最后回到“办公室好不好用”这一核心问题。阅读时可留意 however、instead、compared with 等词如何引出对比，以及文中如何用具体百分比支撑观点。
正文 Many companies want their staff to spend more days in the office . To make offices more attractive , they spend money on new furniture , plants and bright shared areas . But a new report suggests that one basic problem often stays the same : noise .
本段译文 许多公司希望员工每周多花几天待在办公室。为了让办公室更有吸引力，它们花钱添置新家具、绿植和明亮的公共区域。但一份新报告表明，有一个基本问题往往依然如故：噪音。
The report , called Big Questions , comes from Leesman , a company that measures how workers feel about their offices . It draws on more than 1.6 million answers from employees in 10,775 workplaces across 124 countries . In more than 692,000 answers collected between 2022 and early 2026, 70 percent of workers said noise levels were important to their work . However , only 34 percent were happy with the sound in their office .
本段译文 这份名为《Big Questions》（大问题）的报告出自 Leesman，一家衡量员工对办公室感受的公司。报告依据的是来自 124 个国家、10,775 个工作场所的逾 160 万份员工答卷。在 2022 年至 2026 年初收集的逾 69.2 万份答卷中，70% 的员工表示噪音水平对他们的工作很重要。然而，只有 34% 的人对办公室的声音环境感到满意。
Very few offices have solved the problem . Among 2,200 workplaces studied , just four percent reached a high level of satisfaction with noise , which meant that at least 70 percent of staff were happy with it . These quieter offices also did much better overall . On Leesman’s 100- point scale of workplace experience , they scored 84.3 on average compared with 60.5 for offices where people were least happy with noise .
本段译文 真正解决了这个问题的办公室寥寥无几。在被研究的 2,200 个工作场所中，只有 4% 达到了较高的噪音满意度，即至少 70% 的员工对此感到满意。这些更安静的办公室在整体上也表现得好得多。在 Leesman 满分 100 分的工作场所体验评分中，它们平均得分 84.3，而员工对噪音最不满意的办公室平均只有 60.5。
So what made the difference ? It was not private offices . Only six percent of workers in the successful offices had their own room . Headphones did not explain much either : among all 56 office features measured , they showed the smallest gap between good and poor offices . Instead , the best offices offered quiet rooms , phone booths , enough space between desks and different kinds of places to work . Satisfaction with quiet rooms was 50 percentage points higher there than in the offices with the worst noise . People seemed to need somewhere to go when they wanted to focus .
本段译文 那么，差别究竟在哪里？并不在于独立办公室。在这些表现好的办公室里，只有 6% 的员工拥有自己的房间。耳机也说明不了多少问题：在测评的全部 56 项办公设施中，耳机在好办公室和差办公室之间的差距最小。相反，最好的办公室提供安静房间、电话亭、工位之间足够的间距，以及各种不同的工作场所。在这些办公室里，人们对安静房间的满意度比噪音最严重的办公室高出 50 个百分点。人们似乎需要一个想专注时可以去的地方。
Noise is a bigger problem for some workers than for others . About one in five people in one part of the study said they had a disability , a long-term health condition , a mental health difficulty or a neurodivergent profile . Only 19 percent of them were satisfied with office noise , compared with 32 percent of other workers .
本段译文 噪音对一些员工来说比对其他人更成问题。在研究的其中一部分里，约五分之一的人表示自己有残障、长期健康问题、心理健康困难或属于神经多样性人群。他们当中只有 19% 对办公室噪音感到满意，而其他员工的这一比例为 32%。
The report also found that spending money does not always help . Leesman looked at 105 office projects that had surveys before and after the changes . In 25 of them , workers ’ experience became worse . Most gains came from decoration , shared areas and plants , while satisfaction with noise rose by only four percentage points on average
本段译文 报告还发现，花钱并不总能解决问题。Leesman 考察了 105 个在改造前后都做过调查的办公项目。其中 25 个项目改造后员工体验反而变差了。大部分改善来自装饰、公共区域和绿植，而对噪音的满意度平均只提高了 4 个百分点。
Leesman’s message is that a good office is not only about how it looks or how many people come in . It is also about whether people can concentrate once they arrive .
本段译文 Leesman 想传达的是：好办公室不只在于外观如何，也不只在于有多少人来上班，还在于人们到了办公室之后能否集中精力。
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