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"There are many points where people can come together," explains Aura Oslapas, 42, managing director of IDEO's San Francisco office and head of the company's environments practice. "We can link up across projects, disciplines, areas of interest and expertise, or technical knowledge. And the more we keep ourselves open and available, the more opportunities we will have to leverage each person's resident knowledge."

That means creating an environment that "maximizes the 'surface area,' exposing as much of the work to as much of the internal audience as possible," explains Peter Coughlan, 39, a linguist and behavioral scientist who is helping IDEO to redesign its "set." To maximize each project's visibility and to increase the number of opportunities for random input, IDEO's set design includes the placement of common areas, such as worktables, in or near high-traffic areas. Throughout the office, visual connection is critical. For example, the walls of meeting rooms are translucent, so that passersby can see who's inside -- and, if necessary, pop in or pull someone out for a quick chat. The studio's work areas are open, allowing colleagues to "visually eavesdrop" on other projects and groups, as well as to plug into neighboring conversations. It's not uncommon for workers who find themselves struggling with a project simply to shout out a plea for help -- and to draw a crowd of interested coworkers.

Other, less traditional physical elements also play a part in opening up IDEO's offices. In one studio, for example, each worker is given a cubbyhole on a special wall, which they fill with objects that reflect some aspect of their work, professional history, or personality. The result is a kind of three-dimensional employee directory. IDEO designers have encrusted individual cubicles and workstations with artifacts -- models of past projects, toys, posters -- that not only signal who "owns" the space but also serve as conversation starters, grabbing a colleague's attention and sparking a productive dialogue. In fact, some employees keep huge collections of stuff on hand that they use as props when they're trying to describe a design or engineering concept to a colleague. "Often, it's much easier to show people what you're talking about than it is to try to tell them," says Coughlan. "This place is full of icebreakers and conversation pieces."

IDEO's set design may exude a playfulness that suggests that the workplace environment is whimsical and almost random. But, in fact, it's all quite calculated. Just as successful producers know exactly how to build a set that encourages guests to mix it up, so IDEO has worked hard to analyze precisely how a company "set" affects worker interactions. For example, rather than design an environment that "ought" to promote interactions, IDEO carefully observed what its employee communities were already doing that worked, so that it could design components to support those practices. Coughlan's team sent out surveys asking employees to indicate which areas in the office were most conducive to productive interaction. But survey data is notoriously unreliable: Most people significantly underreport how much they collaborate. So Coughlan sought out objective data, suspending video cameras from the rafters above work areas. These cameras allowed him to watch traffic flow and usage patterns and to measure the precise frequency of interactions. The results have the richness of an anthropologist's report, providing detailed descriptions of how various spaces, objects, and people alter the frequency of interactions and thus the flow of information.

Despite all of this formal methodology, however, Kelley remains adamant about the importance of informal interaction -- about the kinds of unscheduled conversations that traditional managers have long dismissed as time wasters. That lesson was driven home recently when an important Japanese client came to the IDEO studio for a design meeting. For hours, with the help of translators, the two parties discussed a project. Yet IDEO's people still weren't clear on the client's expectations or concerns. It took the equivalent of a commercial break to clear things up. "When we had a break and everyone went to their own 'corners,' our Japanese-speaking people could tell us what was really going on with the client," says Kelley. "Only in these informal spaces can you find out what people are really thinking."

In fact, no matter how casual and relaxed a company tries to make its formal gatherings, it needs those "corners" -- those accidental, informal places where employees can separate themselves from the organization and debate the implications of larger events. Too often, companies, like talk shows, "are just faking an informal conversation," says Kelley. "It's staged. It's not spontaneous, so you never really know what's on anyone's mind."

The best talk show, says Kelley, would be one that let you see and hear what was said during commercial breaks, after the camera is switched off and the host and the guests have gone backstage. "I'd much rather be in the greenroom," says Kelley, referring to the pre- and post-talk-show space where guests wait their turn to go on and where they cool off afterward. "That's where the real talk show is."