That is bizzare. Here is how it works where I am at. You are in the kitchen getting a snack, drink, or eating or whatnot and a conversation strikes up. You mention a problem you are facing, they offer a solution or idea. Boom. Progress. On harder problems, these organically grow to brainstorm sessions. This can be with anyone in the org from new developer to someone who used to work on that system to ops to c-level exec to founder of the company. After all is said and done, it is up to the individuals to be mature and communicate discoveries or insights to the rest of the team. This will happen at scrum or via email. Sometimes a real meeting gets set up when there are others who need to be in the discussion and an email thread won't cut it. The only times it is a pain for us is when those in a different office forget to communicate outward which is not very often. I can only think of two times that it was apparent that water cooler conversations did not bubble up but still led critical designs at an inter-team level. And we are open enough to call out the lapse and work towards it not happening more often. I would not like working at a place where I had to stop communication in the kitchen and book a meeting for work related talk.