The dangers of open space offices

A data protection campaign by Fellowes found that it is typically at the workstations of open space offices where confidential documents are left lying around, not on the desks of managers. It seems that the problem with open space offices is that no one feels it is their own. A survey conducted by Szinapszis revealed that 40 percent of the responding cleaning staff have already found confidential documents in these offices.

Managers are more careful: only 22 percent of cleaners said they had found such documents on their desks. Meeting rooms are also sources of danger as very often confidential information isn’t wiped off from flipcharts and notes of the meeting are left on the tables. Confidential documents can also be found unprotected in the area of printers and photocopiers.

About one quarter of Hungarian SMEs have no document management regulations at all – revealed the Fellowes survey.