I've worked in both, and both have their benefits. However, my evaluation of open office may be biased because we also use slack. Regarding open office plans:

I've worked in both, and both have their benefits. However, my evaluation of open office may be biased because we also use slack. Regarding open office plans: Focus does suffer in an open layout. Creativity does suffer too. In the face of a fire in production, an open office creates a low friction environment for task distribution to handle it. A factor that makes up for this is that we can work from home one day a week. I find these times to allow me to be most creative for planning long term solutions. Occasional remote work is possible and effective thanks to several technologies including Slack. Regarding individual or paired offices: focus is easy to accomplish, and it is easier to be creative. It can be quiet, but it sure feels lonely when my team members take 3-6 minutes to walk to. Unfortunately, meetings, ad-hoc visits, and email were the communication methods here. Remote work was near impossible and impractical with just email for peer involved processes. This was also in a very corp-legacy environment and my ability to make an impact was unsatisfying. So I feel my creativity was often wasted and unvalued. Overall, I think I like what I have now, which is mostly open office, but still occasional time for individual creativity.