It’s almost like there’s an entire management philosophy our economy pushes that’s categorically suboptimal for and often at odds with making a solid, sustainable, and engineering-first organization.
The only thing “classical” business experts are good at is trying to find the quickest route to monetization. This pretty much never yields a product that actual helps people in a meaningful and consistent fashion in the long term.
Make a thing, and make it well, and it will sell itself. Boeing did this until they acquihired McDonnell Douglass leadership and transitioned their entire business model towards being “investor-first”… and that gave us delights like the 737 MCAS debacle (exacerbated, of course, by deregulation and poor auditing). They used to be one of the true paragons of American engineering. Now they’re just another profit über alles corporation.
Engineering-centric organizations need to focus a whole hell of a lot more on engineering ethics. These days, it’s mostly an afterthought.