I used to work for an all-remote company in which hallway conversations happened all the time over chat. In fact, people would often hold several hallway conver

I used to work for an all-remote company in which hallway conversations happened all the time over chat. In fact, people would often hold several hallway conversations at the same time using separate chat windows for each. The organization was set up for remote work and had chosen appropriate technology. Where I work currently, we had a no-remote policy although our team is spread across two continents. The rationale for in-person-only-sort-of was that the organization could extract greater value from employees through the benefits of hallway conversations (except between team members in different offices). Hallway conversations just didn't happen; neither in-team or between teams. They happened in formal meetings where half the attendees just looked down at their phones. When we went temporarily remote-only in March of 2020, we were not given any adequate technology (and in fact the required VPN technology prevented many from doing their jobs so it was often hacked). Eventually, many of the employees discovered there was a chat service and people who had never spoken before started communicating. Hallway conversations were had (initially mostly focused on hacking the VPN). Formal meetings were still run by the same people with similar output, but over-all productivity began to climb and we pushed out releases on time and on budget. It turns out at least our segment of the larger organization worked better remotely despite the lack of support and the official policies. Recently it was announced that the entire organization would be returning to in-office only, 100% of the time. The errant chat service would be shut down. We would return to exactly the way it was two years ago because that is the only way that works, according to the CEO. We will return in the fall to no hallway conversations, head down at our desks focused on our assigned tasks, communication trickled down from the top as it should be.