Women's complaints about cold offices are right

In what will come as no surprise to most of us, women are right again.

It's cold.

For my entire work career, female co-workers have complained about the temperature in the office. Occasionally, it's too hot. Far more often, it's too cold.

Walk through offices where I've worked on any winter day – and I suspect this is true nearly everywhere in America – and you see women with jackets on or women wrapped in blankets. They'll have space heaters on and maybe ski caps.

My experience isn't necessarily representative of everyone's. But in my career I've worked in six offices and in every single one, there were women who were perpetually cold during the winter. Mrs. Brad worked in multiple offices and was cold in all of them.

When women complain that it's too cold, they're right.

Not necessarily that the offices are too cold, although that's likely true. But they are right when they say it makes it harder to work when it's cold.

A study published last spring (when it was getting warm!) in the journal PLOS One showed that women improve their performance on basic tests as rooms got warmer. Specifically, the scientists said that women's math score went up two points and their verbal score went up one point for every degree the room increased.

(Of course, the study was in Germany, so "one degree" means "one degree Celsius." So to translate, you subtract 32 from umm . . . no, you add 32 and divide by . . . umm . . . IT'S TOO COLD IN HERE! OR MAYBE TOO HOT!)

Men, meanwhile, somehow improved in cooler rooms. But here's why women are right: Men's scores didn't really decrease much as it got warmer. In other words, cooler rooms hurt women and narrowly help men. Warmer rooms help women and really don't affect men.

Still . . . most offices stay cool. And women suffer.

As the researchers concluded, “Our results suggest that in gender-balanced workplaces, temperatures should be set significantly higher than current standards.”

Sure, employers may consider that a cost. After all, when you consider the cost of electricity (or gas) from PG&E, combined with all the extra fees they'll sneak on there to get the rest of us to cover the cost of the lawsuits they'll lose due to recent wildfires they caused, the bill can get expensive.

But employers should consider the other side of this argument. Keeping the office at 68 degrees (or 70 or 72) when half the employees are cold not only makes it a tough place to work, it hurts productivity.

Don't believe me? Just ask your female co-worker who is wearing her parka while slaving away at the cubicle next to yours.

I asked Sayeda, a friend who works in my office and was recently wrapped in a blanket while working. She agreed with the study's findings and attributed it to men having more hemoglobin.

"That sounds right," I told her. "Although I have no idea what hemoglobin is."

If the office were a little cooler, maybe I'd know. But Sayeda's performance would suffer.

Reach Brad Stanhope at bradstanhope@hotmail.com.