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Your Air-Conditioned Office Could Be Hurting Your Productivity—Here’s How to Fight Back

Shivering isn’t a good use of your time.
Photographer: Getty Iamges
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With the mercury peaking and the dog days of summer setting in, offices everywhere are fighting back the only way they know how: by cranking up the AC.

As great as that first wave of cool air feels when you step inside on a muggy day, many offices tend to be too cool. This isn’t just about comfort. A wide body of research suggests there’s a link between the temperature of a workplace and worker productivity. If employees are freezing, their output freezes as well. The problem is amplified during the summer, when office buildings typically blast the AC while workers wear lighter clothes.