I mean, that's one direction. But we could also give the part-time engineer more autonomy so that they can quickly make decisions on their own. They'll still need to spend time talking to people, but they can figure out an effective way to do that based on context—which might start out with them spending more time during the week just talking to people, but will fall off quickly once they build an understanding of their domain and the external interfaces of whatever they're building.

If my experience is anything to go by, this sort of self-directed collaboration—think "design discussions" rather than "meetings" or "ceremonies"—will end up far more productive for everyone involved.