Others on the team function differently
Compare:
1. A role which requires very little communication with the rest of team and quite a lot of long, uninterrupted concentration.
E.g. a developer working a long time on some internally intricate sub-system which has well-defined interfaces to the rest of the system.
2. E.g. a UX designer (or perhaps a product manager) who needs to talk to many people, whose projects shift quickly, whose work affects many other people's work, etc.
This is far better than simply talking to many people 1 to 1. It creates a written history indicating why each design element was chosen. It allows stakeholders to understand the requirements behind a particularly strange UX choice and allows them to give suggestions for better UX in a way that takes those requirements into account. Iteration can be faster as comments can be taken from all sides at the same time instead of having to seek people out and set up meetings.
I only see positives for a UX designer given the nature of their work is highly visual, functional and is cross-organizational. In fact, I think any company NOT doing UX design this way is probably being inefficient?
Sad but true.
Studies are mixed on the pros/cons of office vs remote. For example a Stanford study showed productivity increased 9 to 13% for remote office workers. Some have shown that collaboration can increase as well as communication was more intentional (I don't remember the study offhand).
Anyways, point is it's not all or nothing and the data is still out on effectiveness and efficiency (I'd think it also depends on the nature of the work etc)