My experience is that managers at the director level contribute very little to the actual progress of a project but do get a lot of the glory if it succeeds. Maybe he can really drive innovation at Intel, or maybe the special sauce (namely, the engineers working under him) that worked at Apple just won't apply.
My experience is that managers at the director level contribute very little to the actual progress of a project but do get a lot of the glory if it succeeds
As already described in several books, the structure of the company or area matters immensely for innovation [1] [2]. In this regard, a director can have great influence on this structure by knowing which buttons to push.
He was actually an engineer apparently. I would say that differentiates him from a regular MBA suit. At the very least he can tell who is contributing on the team and what gaps need to be filled. Someone without experience would have to rely on someone else to determine this and who knows the qualifications of who he's relying on.
Prior to working for Apple, Wilcox was at Intel where he served as a principal engineer on PC chipsets
This may be the case in very small companies. But in large orgs with complex projects and dozens/hundreds of stakeholders a great manager makes way more of an impact than any IC.
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My experience is that managers at the director level contribute very little to the actual progress of a project but do get a lot of the glory if it succeeds. Maybe he can really drive innovation at Intel, or maybe the special sauce (namely, the engineers working under him) that worked at Apple just won't apply.
As already described in several books, the structure of the company or area matters immensely for innovation [1] [2]. In this regard, a director can have great influence on this structure by knowing which buttons to push.
[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Innovator%27s_Dilemma
[2] https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/39863447-loonshots
buttons have to be there first though.
He was actually an engineer apparently. I would say that differentiates him from a regular MBA suit. At the very least he can tell who is contributing on the team and what gaps need to be filled. Someone without experience would have to rely on someone else to determine this and who knows the qualifications of who he's relying on.
Prior to working for Apple, Wilcox was at Intel where he served as a principal engineer on PC chipsets
This may be the case in very small companies. But in large orgs with complex projects and dozens/hundreds of stakeholders a great manager makes way more of an impact than any IC.