In my experience many execs know what they're talking about.
Where I feel you may see real variance is ethical and capability standards: willingness to stick to a line, and competence in analysis and execution based on what is known. Sometimes, hidden agendas can be misread as lack of competence, ie ethical lapses cause actions that are misread as capability lapses.
Knowledge alone is less often a factor.
Of course this varies widely across companies. I've been fortunate to work with some excellent folk at executive and C-level.
Here, an exec clearly (a) understands or can make a clear, direct assessment and (b) was willing to do so in writing. Kudos on both grounds.
I think a different variant/opposite of Hanlon's razor applies when it comes to corporate or political decisions: Don't attribute to stupidity when it can be adequately explained by malice or greed.
This sounds rather obvious, but I feel people forget it far too often.
Oh, I think MS execs (and all other execs, top-level politicians, and pundits for that matter) know what they're talking about, but they'll tell whatever lies they need to enrich and empower themselves.
In my experience many execs know what they're talking about.
Where I feel you may see real variance is ethical and capability standards: willingness to stick to a line, and competence in analysis and execution based on what is known. Sometimes, hidden agendas can be misread as lack of competence, ie ethical lapses cause actions that are misread as capability lapses.
Knowledge alone is less often a factor.
Of course this varies widely across companies. I've been fortunate to work with some excellent folk at executive and C-level.
Here, an exec clearly (a) understands or can make a clear, direct assessment and (b) was willing to do so in writing. Kudos on both grounds.
I think a different variant/opposite of Hanlon's razor applies when it comes to corporate or political decisions: Don't attribute to stupidity when it can be adequately explained by malice or greed.
This sounds rather obvious, but I feel people forget it far too often.
I call this the Hanlon's Handgun:
"Never attribute to stupidity that which can be adequately explained by systemic incentives promoting malice."
Previously: https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&qu...
You can see the same dynamic playing out in this very thread too.
Oh, I think MS execs (and all other execs, top-level politicians, and pundits for that matter) know what they're talking about, but they'll tell whatever lies they need to enrich and empower themselves.
Do you think msft market cap is just an accident, or...?