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There's also the fact that there's no more privacy when talking to colleagues. At some point I wanted to speak to my boss privately (to tell him I wanted to quit) but couldn't find a right time since there was always someone within hearing distance. Eventually, I've just sent him an email, so the open office layout definitely didn't help here with with ease of interaction.

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I think open office layouts need to be paired with easily accessed private rooms. The successful layouts I've seen will have a large area everyone works in with the outer walls lined with small and medium sized meeting rooms. Either for private conversations, personal phone calls, or if a team needs to meet and not disrupt everyone else. I can see how an open layout with literally no private space would be terrible.

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