"There are companies with data needs, user counts, and codebase sizes on par with Google that don't practice Google-style process, yet succeed anyway."

Let's start with "how big do you think Google's codebase is"?

Because the last time we went looking, the number of companies even close was <10, and they all pretty much have the same as Google's process.

If you really have examples, i know the engineering productivity guys would love to hear about them and talk to these folks.