Working in sport has a distinctive sound.

Constant movement. Staff working under pressure. Sessions rolling over. Players talking. Balls being kicked. Music drifting from the gym.

It feels productive. Like work is getting done.

Then you hear something else.

A conversation that should have been in a meeting room. A voice that cuts through everything. A group gathering nearby, volume rising.

Still feels normal. Still feels like sport.

But here's what cognitive research reveals about that "normal."

A 5-decibel increase in noise, barely perceptible, creates measurable damage.

We're talking about the difference between a few people talking and a whole group. A quiet road becoming busy. A bathroom fan turning on. Almost nothing.

Yet that threshold shift reduces complex working memory by 23.5%. Working memory drops 11.5%. Attention falls 5%.

Fluctuating noise makes it worse. Sudden peaks, interruptions, that loud personality whose voice carries for miles. More damaging than constant background hum.

Think about what this means in practice.

Your analysts solving complex puzzles? A 23% handicap. Performance staff planning an athlete's next training block? An 11% handicap. Coaches and players in review sessions? 5% less focused.

The environment is taxing them. Nobody notices.

Here's what I keep coming back to.

High-performance obsesses over marginal gains. Sleep. Nutrition. Recovery. Load management. Every measurable domain gets attention.

Yet acoustic environment, a factor creating double-digit cognitive impacts, goes unexamined.

This is an opportunity.

The intervention isn't expensive. It starts with awareness.

Walk your facility this week. Not to inspect. To listen.

Notice conversations bleeding into open spaces. Gathering points near desks. Voices carrying through thin walls.

Then ask: Is this noise serving my people's performance, or taxing it?

Some organisations are already redesigning with this in mind. Quiet zones for complex work. High-traffic conversations moved to appropriate rooms. Simply being present to acoustic reality.

The competitive advantage isn't the intervention. It's recognising what everyone else ignores.

Your staff deserve full capacity. So do your players.

Be present. Listen. Act.