Why should we work together?

Available for over a year

Open plan offices, hot-desking, group brainstorming sessions: collaboration seems to be king in the modern workplace. Recent studies have found that we are spending up to 80% of our working days either in meetings or dealing with requests from our colleagues. But is working together really the best way? Is the idea of collaboration something we’re fetishising at the cost of productivity and creativity, and have we lost sight of the benefits of working alone? Nastaran Tavakoli-Far shares her own dislike of the BBC’s open-plan office and asks, in some desperation: why should we work together? Guests: Art Markman, professor of psychology and marketing at the University of Texas at Austin, and author of Bring Your Brain to Work Kerstin Sailer, reader in social and spatial networks, The Bartlett School of Architecture, University College London Susan Cain, author of Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can't Stop Talking John Maeda, global head of design at Automattic Image: Workers in an open-plan office (Credit: Getty Images)