Nowadays, a lot of offices have open-space design instead of separate rooms. Do the advantages outweigh the disadvantages?
Sample Response
That in recent years, open-space offices are replacing offices with separate roomsworking areas with separate rooms has become a hot topic of debate. In my opinion, the advantagespositives of this trend overshadow the negatives.
On the one hand, open spaces have two drawbacks, which are an increased level of distraction and risks to employees’ healthrisks to employee’s health. First, working in a communal space easily distracts employeesdrives one to distraction. From noise from phone callsnoises of phone calls to colleagues conversing, an employee faces numerous distractionsloads of disturbances that can reduce their work efficiencycost them their work efficiency. What is more, a communal office space is an ideal environment for diseases to spread. Take the “3 green” model that was employed by various factories during the height of Covid-19 in Vietnam for example, due to the employees living in close proximity, Covid-19 spreaded easily and the model had to be deployed soon.
Despite the disadvantages, I believe the advantages of open-plan offices are more significantconsiderable. First, an open-space office can facilitate communication and foster professional relationships among employeesfriendships between employees. An open space allows employees to communicate with one another more freely and promptlytimely. This leads to ideas flowing more smoothlyeffortlessly and innovations to emergeinnovations to be born more quickly. Furthermore, by working together and having more chances to get to know each other, employees can form stronger bonds, thus boosting the company’s culture. Moreover, open-space offices help save costscost on amenities such as printers, scanners, and lockers. Whereas separate offices require a large amount of this equipmenta multitude of these equipment, employees who work in an open-plan office can share these utilities.
In conclusion, I believe that the advantages of open-plan offices eclipse theirits drawbacks. Due to theirits ability to help the company cut costs and facilitate interaction and innovation, open-space offices are the future of workspaceworking space.
Why this response received Band 7.5
The essay’s strongest feature is its clear position and well-balanced development of both drawbacks and advantages, supported by relevant workplace examples. Its main limitation is a cluster of imprecise collocations and grammatical slips that slightly weaken an otherwise fluent argument. The best next step is to refine word combinations and proofread agreement, countability, and verb forms while preserving the strong structure.
IELTS Writing Criteria Scores
Task Response
The response answers the question directly, sustains a clear judgement, and develops both sides with relevant explanations and examples.
Refine the health example so its direct connection to open-plan offices and its role in the final comparison are completely explicit.
Coherence and Cohesion
Ideas progress logically through well-focused paragraphs, with cohesive devices and referencing generally managed effectively.
Vary repeated sequencing devices and use transitions that state the precise relationship between neighbouring ideas.
Lexical Resource
Vocabulary is varied and often precise, although several awkward collocations and word-form choices reduce naturalness.
Replace combinations such as “more considerable” and “save cost” with idiomatic comparative and cost-related expressions.
Grammatical Range and Accuracy
A wide range of sentence forms is used with good control, though agreement, countability, and irregular verb errors remain noticeable.
Proofread noun-pronoun agreement, uncountable nouns, and irregular past forms after drafting each paragraph.
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IELTS Writing Task 2
Nowadays, a lot of offices have open-space design instead of separate rooms. Do the advantages outweigh the disadvantages?
Your response
Write the task yourself, then compare your choices with the annotated response.