I dont think it is that open plan offices have to be bad. I have worked in environments where they worked reasonably well. Typically there were a couple thing

I dont think it is that open plan offices have to be bad. I have worked in environments where they worked reasonably well. Typically there were a couple things that helped including team (a small area dedicated to a team that worked closely together to solve problems), and an environment or workload that did not include multitasking (call centers are good for this most of the time despite the auditory distractions). The problem though is that in chaotic environments, open plan offices are disasters waiting to happen, or maybe they are disasters constantly happening. You have no insulation from anything else and so no ability to be productive and take real control. On the whole the fact is that distractions come in different forms and all forms of distractions have pros and cons. A fully isolated environment is productivity-killing. We need some socialization to be productive. On the other hand, open plan offices very often are too social. On the whole I prefer working from home. Sure there are distractions, but on the whole, my productivity is best there. I can insulate myself often from the distractions and break time with family members is a wonderful perk.