There is pretty much overwhelming research that people are more productive and healthy at work when they have some privacy and don't have distractions. One exa

There is pretty much overwhelming research that people are more productive and healthy at work when they have some privacy and don't have distractions. One example - a study published in the Journal of Environmental Psychology of more than 40,000 workers in 300 US office buildings: "...Enclosed private offices clearly outperformed open-plan layouts in most aspects of IEQ (Indoor Environmental Quality), particularly in acoustics, privacy and the proxemics issues. Benefits of enhanced 'ease of interaction' were smaller than the penalties of increased noise level and decreased privacy resulting from open-plan office configuration." https://www.inc.com/geoffrey-james/science-just-proved-that-open-plan-offices-destroy-productivity.html https://www.inc.com/geoffrey-james/science-just-proved-that-... This article talks about some of the other research on the health effects and other effects on productivity: https://www.newyorker.com/business/currency/the-open-office-trap https://www.newyorker.com/business/currency/the-open-office-... >...and the answer is to find a workspace that suits you, not try to apply the work environment that works for you to the entire industry. Unfortunately, the trend seems to be to apply the open office design to all environments which is hurting people. The best environments I have seen are when there are individual offices with plenty of open areas and conference rooms for people to meet.