I think WFH works well because it takes extra effort to reach out to someone and therefore is used more as a necessity. For me, the office has lent itself to a number of one-off tasks that didn't end up being important that distracted working on the recurring production items that make a larger impact. Removing the starting and stopping lends itself to more productivity and being able to answer the phone as opposed to having to step out of the office after going down the elevator has been great.
I agree! Having a _minimal_ barrier to communication acts as a filter, in a similar way that requiring registration acts as a quality filter for a forum. Folks must gather interest in the meeting, rather than interrupt and demand focus; this, at minimum, gives them some time to reconsider the concepts that they want to raise with their coworkers.
Not just any minimal barrier. Extroverts wired to speak spontaneously (i.e., have high Foxp2 gene expression) are the most likely to disrupt others for non-functional reasons. Requiring verbal communication to be initiated through written means is a great way to increase the signal-to-noise threshold for communication. Meanwhile, those who are not spontaneously verbal have a relatively low barrier (a sentence in chat).
