As much as I can sometimes come off as against face-t0-face meetings (I’m certainly not) or in favor of virtual collaboration, I will readily admit that sitting across the table from someone that you are working with has incredible value. Being able to see if their frustrations match yours or if they agree or disagree through body language can be significant for resolving communication differences.
It can often be easy to take a passive aggressive or sarcastic attitude on phone calls or email. But get face-to-face and that goes away (unless you’ve completely established a difficult working relationship to start with). Perspective from being in the same room…..it’s often refreshing.