4 Jan
2022
4 Jan
'22
8:42 a.m.
On Jan 4, 2022, at 10:40 AM, Grant Taylor via cctalk
<cctalk at classiccmp.org> wrote:
On 1/4/22 12:14 AM, Chuck Guzis via cctalk wrote:
Being a founder doesn't necessarily help much if the company gets big and chairwarmers
take control. It's one thing if you're a chairwarmer yourself and rise to CEO,
but if you're a top engineer you may be in a non-control position -- especially back
then when managers were managers and engineers just did what they were told.
For another example, consider Steve Jobs, who didn't even leave Apple voluntarily.
paul
Seymour Cray, along with Bill Norris and Jim
Thornton and others left Remington Rand/UNIVAC after Rand bought the near-bankrupt ERA.
Apparently, the work environment at Rand was felt to be stifling. Norris had all of the
Navy connections and was a great marketer, so bringing some of Rand's engineering
talent along was a natural.
Interesting.
I guess I thought that since Seymour left CDC to form Cray Research, that meant that he
was more of an employee at CDC and had less influence on how it operated as a company. I
would have assumed that someone that was a founder would have had more influence and tried
to improve things before splitting off and forming yet another new company.