1 - I don't think he's trying to use bureaucrat precisely here - he's saying that the role of engineering manager is more valuable if they understand their domain vs. if they do not. This seems uncontroversial; staffing decisions for projects are more likely to be made correctly when those projects are understood.
2 - "should not" and "will not" are not the same thing. A huge part of bridging the divide between general management and engineering management is finessing the issue of performance/productivity measurement.
3 - Yeah I agree, I like a lot of Larson's stuff but not this. I kind of wonder how much of it is even real vs. just posturing; as you say it doesn't scale well at all, and he's worked at very large companies.
2 - "should not" and "will not" are not the same thing. A huge part of bridging the divide between general management and engineering management is finessing the issue of performance/productivity measurement.
3 - Yeah I agree, I like a lot of Larson's stuff but not this. I kind of wonder how much of it is even real vs. just posturing; as you say it doesn't scale well at all, and he's worked at very large companies.