I wish the “how much an engineer can focus” section was first, because that’s been by far the biggest bottleneck in most organizations in my experience.
All the other things the engineers can themselves address (e.g. better tooling, etc), but the organization’s culture around protecting makers schedule is impossible to address individually
> All the other things the engineers can themselves address (e.g. better tooling, etc)
Everyone choosing their own tools? Isn't there usually some central department that takes care about that, at best controlled by a kind of committee representing those who use the tools, typically full of people who are no longer doing practical work and have no idea what improvements have been made outside of the company during the last decades?
No, the best organizations have a happy path laid out for org chosen tools and a platform that supports adding in “non standard” tools / libraries by individuals and teams as needed, with a defined path toward those additions become the new golden path standard.
There needs go be a balance. Common tools are useful, but you need to switch which tool you use from time to time as the old one gets stagnant (or bought out and the new owners raise the price too high).
Sometimes people change tools for the wrong reason. I've been in many companies that changed their bug tracker because the old one was too cumbersome, but they never addressed why all those mandatory fields were added to the old one, and so in a few years they learn the hard way and now the new one is cumbersome because of all the mandatory fields.
All the other things the engineers can themselves address (e.g. better tooling, etc), but the organization’s culture around protecting makers schedule is impossible to address individually