Isn't OKRs and other systems supposed to solve this?

Don't communicate weightless, measureless, abstract fluff. Give clear goals, a utility function to combine them, deadlines or other time incentives (discounting or bonuses for being early), gather feedback, align with personal affinity, break down responsibility between groups (SREs, infra and platform teams provide the reliability, others build on that).

Set budgets and fix the constraints, draw up the solution space and let the people work.

It's not a mystery.