Comms is the staff skill
Security engineers often prefer a stack trace to a memo. Comms and politics feel like overhead on top of the real work.
They are part of the real work. A control that nobody funds or understands doesn't reduce risk. Say you want to roll out hardware security keys. You can be right about the threat and still lose the budget, because the person who decides never saw the case in terms they care about.
So write the one-page memo. The first line states the ask and the date a decision is needed. Then the problem in plain words, the cost of doing nothing, the smallest option that works, and what you will measure. No jargon. If the reader has to look up a term, rewrite it.
Politics is the same skill. It means knowing who is affected, who decides, and who should hear it from you before the meeting. Ten minutes with the engineering lead beforehand can turn an objection into a change in the draft.
This is what separates a staff engineer from a senior one. A senior engineer finds the right fix. A staff engineer also gets it funded and adopted by teams that don't report to them.
Next time you have a good idea, write it on one page and send it to the person most likely to disagree.