Comment by ThinkBeat

A constant focus on keeping the architecture,infrastructure and codebase quick/ease to ship is to "Keep It Simple Stupid".

Be critical about adding new services or complexity.

Ask yourself can this be solved in a way that does not require changes to the shipping process. If no, evaluate possible alternate approaches.

A fanatical dedication to monitoring the production system is beneficial. The faster you can catch that the last deploy screwed something up, the less stress and down time there will be.

The shipping process should also include the ability a rollback the latest deployment. Again less stress and possible downtime there will be.

Achieving these goals is the best way to win the trust and influence on the people up the chain.