At Intercom, technical conservatism is a guiding principle that emphasizes reusing existing technologies and frameworks in the stack, promoting tried and tested patterns and solutions. This approach helps teams focus on improving products by building, releasing, and iterating on solutions, rather than evaluating new technologies and spending time on already solved operational problems. By leveraging familiar infrastructure, such as Elasticsearch, Intercom has been able to scale faster and deliver value more quickly, while also making the most of team time and compounds the value of ongoing improvements. Technical conservatism is not a hard-and-fast rule, but rather a guideline that allows teams to stay focused on what's important - solving customer problems and delivering value - while still being open to introducing new technologies when they offer significant benefits.