Effective remote (at least for tech) requires a different culture and often different tool use which make it difficult to be 'hybrid' (i.e some workers are remote and some not). This limits the ability to incrementally adopt remote work and so typically companies have to start with the gene.
Stuff like tapping a co-worker on the shoulder for an ad-hoc question is generally an anti-pattern. It likely knocks them out of flow and means your documentation and internal tools don't allow engineers to answer their own questions. But it's so baked into how companies work that you have to start a new company and train engineers to approach knowledge sharing differently.
Similarly ad-hoc 'fortuitous' discussions around the automated coffee maker to hatch potential new projects/designs/products or whatever company executives think are happening aren't really the best forum for that - they by chance, they aren't necessarily going to be inclusive, and the premise there is that you're essentially expecting work when the goal is to take a break. The expectation seems to be that I may see Bob from $other_team and query him on his current projects while the automated coffee maker takes a few minutes to cough out a latte-like substance but, again, there should be better ways to let me know about potentially useful team intersections rather than bugging bob while he is trying to get a break.
Stuff like tapping a co-worker on the shoulder for an ad-hoc question is generally an anti-pattern. It likely knocks them out of flow and means your documentation and internal tools don't allow engineers to answer their own questions. But it's so baked into how companies work that you have to start a new company and train engineers to approach knowledge sharing differently.
Similarly ad-hoc 'fortuitous' discussions around the automated coffee maker to hatch potential new projects/designs/products or whatever company executives think are happening aren't really the best forum for that - they by chance, they aren't necessarily going to be inclusive, and the premise there is that you're essentially expecting work when the goal is to take a break. The expectation seems to be that I may see Bob from $other_team and query him on his current projects while the automated coffee maker takes a few minutes to cough out a latte-like substance but, again, there should be better ways to let me know about potentially useful team intersections rather than bugging bob while he is trying to get a break.