I guess it's not even the watching - I really don't care about it. It would be nice to have fewer distractions from people walking by, chatting nearby, chatting to me, etc.
It's not the watching. It's the entitlement people feel that they can talk/disrupt to you at any time, even if you have your headphones on and are clearly focused.
Those who make the decision still have a full blown office with real walls and a door so won't be negatively affected. It's mostly pushed because the open office idea is cheaper and allows managers to see butts in seats. Studies show it's a bad idea but people talk about collaboration and whatnot as an excuse.
In my experience "collaboration" means talking about basically anything except work.
How some idiot on the executive floor got the idea that we all just walk around spontaneously gabbing about ways to make them more money is beyond me.
Much of the corporate world is dedicated to mindless churn and professional time wasting.
The more an organization pushes the whole "in office", "collaboration", "water cooler conversations" narrative, the more professional time wasters they have on their payroll. When the only metrics you have are butts in seats, you can't see how little work you're actually getting for your money.
Because the decisions like that made by the people who don't know shit about these things or don't care to know shit - most likely, it's also cheaper for them to run this kind of office anyway.
Who would imagine that. I’d much prefer a cubicle over an open office. Open offices are much cheaper to make so they try to sell us some bullshit to make it seem the best way forward.