There are so many amazing tools these days, all with different features and capabilities. If you took 10 colleagues and allowed them to use their favourite tools you would end up with 25 different tools. (OK, I am exaggerating for effect here but you get my point.) This can lead to a lot of fragmentation, with diagrams, designs, and documentation spread out over multiple tools requiring accounts and payments. If there’s a large team then even small costs multiply up really quickly.

Organisations try to control these costs by only paying for a specific set of tools and requiring staff to use those. When that doesn’t include one of your favourites that can be annoying. I have been there. I have been the one pestering a manager to introduce a specific tool but these days I try to work with whatever is available.

A system diagram drawn using boxes and lines might not look as pretty as one created in a specific tool. If it gets the point across and you can embed it in the official tool you use for documentation then it’s infinitely more valuable than one that’s perfect but nobody else can access. Even if it takes you a bit longer to make it than in the perfect tool, that’s usually time better spent than arguing with colleagues about paying for the one you’d prefer to use.

Are you spending more time arguing about what tools to use than actually using the ones you have?