Skilled and talented engineering teams often become “known” for the solution they provide successfully to customers. This is dangerous.
Impact to customer value
Once an engineering team comes to identify themselves with their solution, they inadvertently try to fit and adapt the problem to the solution, instead of the other way around.
More worryingly, teams tend to discount better alternate solutions, even if they fit the problem better. Reasons given are higher amount of time to solve, unknown unknowns, low skills etc.
This results in customers getting the short end of the stick, as their problem is not adequately addressed.
Impact to shareholder profits
The identification tendency is not only displayed by the team, but also the organization at large. This unfortunately boxes the team into being a one trick pony and stops innovation.
Once a team is unable to extend existing solutions with alternate mechanisms, the problem is left for other engineering teams to solve - often with higher costs.