"...That said, I just don’t encounter the need for deep strategy and vision-setting sessions with cross-functional teams of my colleagues on a frequent basis. .

"...That said, I just don’t encounter the need for deep strategy and vision-setting sessions with cross-functional teams of my colleagues on a frequent basis. ..." And you won't, either. I think this is very simple. Either you are a distributed team working on digital artifacts that live primarily online .... or you are a cross-functional team trying to creatively solve a problem for somebody. If you know what you're doing, the solution is locked in, and all you're accomplishing by showing up somewhere is moving cards around on a wall? Stay home. If you don't know what you're doing -- requirements are in flux, the customer can't decide, the project is high-risk/high-stress, etc? Show up where the other people are. And it doesn't have to be one way or the other. I've worked great projects where we all co-located, got into a groove, then finished it up from home -- only to repeat when the next big hunk of problems showed up. So many of these tech essays seem to based on turning the contrast way up, insisting that the answer must be X or Y, then defending it. Why can't it be both? Seeing success in teams working both ways, wouldn't the more logical position be that in some cases each has its advantages?