We live in a society run by those who are the least proficient among its members. We live in a society that has convinced itself that the specific details of a thing are some kind of marginal trivia and that the further removed you are from actually doing the thing, the more valuable your job is (which is somehow also known as "moving up"). They've created an entire discipline around justifying this scheme, a kind of management apologetics. They've created cute, little words to try to place this lie on equal footing with real proficiency and to marginalize those with such as merely "technical". Words like "functional", "directional", and "visionary" are intended to create a sense of existential equality between the competency have's and have not's. No, scratch that. "Technical" is often used in the pejorative. They think these cute, little words are the whole show, and since society has drank the kook-aid—they have become the whole show. We have entire legions of students studying, not science, not a trade, but management. Management of what, you ask? No, no, that's not the point. They're just going to manage.
"You should push some of those buttons and do more of that technical stuff. There, I did the hard part for you."
Somehow that's loftier and more important than actually knowing how to do the work. It's amusing to think of the common, comedic plot depicting a young, up-and-coming individual who's just displayed their talent being swarmed by a mob of shady, quick talkers all wanting to be their "manager". Yet when applied to a person with a suit and tie, the term suddenly becomes laudable, if no closer to any actual productivity.
"But someone has to set a direction. Someone has to say which button to push. Someone has to manage."
Well, of course someone has to say which button to push, you blithering twit! The fallacy behind this—and, indeed, that which underlies all of management apologetics—is that it assumes that you do not have to be intelligent enough to know how to push the button yet could, mysteriously, still be intelligent enough to say which button to push. And, conversely, that those who are intelligent enough to know how to push the button could not possibly be able to tell themselves which button to push without having someone less competent than them set a "functional direction".
"But we have to have some kind of structure for society. What other option is there?"
What if those that actually did the thing got paid the most? What if we turned the structure on its head and exalted those that actually produce the thing over those that merely say it should be produced? Sure, having someone around to keep track of the insidious "big picture" does free up the producers to do more producing. If you listen closely to that statement, however, you will hear the inherent priority. Managers have their place, and that place is in support of the producers—not living large on their backs. I'm not suggesting that every assembly line worker is actually qualified (or even desirous) of running the company. I'm just imagining a world where the proficient are not enslaved to the incompetent and where managers and other support workers aspire to—one day, if they work hard—become able to contribute something more tangible than "direction", instead of the other way around.
"Good luck with that."
People are beginning to awaken to the absurdity (as they always do) of the top-heavy structure created by putting the least competent in charge. As this happens, we will see executive stubbornness brought to a new level and words like "vision" and "entrepreneurial ability" desperately touted as salvation. As the people that truly execute against the plan start to question the decisions made by the people whose only product is decision-making, we will see the decision-makers stubbornly reject all opposition and oversight. When the true executives fully realize that the managers' decisions are no less random, no more informed, no better than their own, the societal dialog will shift to the question most feared by those in power: why do managers—those that actually do the least—deserve so much more than everyone else, than those actually doing the thing?