You could say the same thing about RIM, Nokia, or Microsoft. These companies are no doubt full of brilliant people, and they have the finances to hire more, but

You could say the same thing about RIM, Nokia, or Microsoft. These companies are no doubt full of brilliant people, and they have the finances to hire more, but the ability of your workforce doesn't solve every problem. A lot of these industrial companies do have very bright engineers on staff, and they regularly hire consultants and analysts, and they have the money to pay companies like mine to create highly-specific simulations. I'm not sure where the balance is struck, or why they have the organization that they do, but they're suffering on many levels without the insight to address it. For my own professional development, I would like to better understand the motivations of these industrial mega-corps. I get the sense that they often don't understand themselves, and suffer from a sort of cultural poisoning. The "meta-game" of my business is figuring out how each of these companies think. Ultimately, we're hired to solve problems, and the software we make is but a tool to this end. You'd be surprised by how often we're commissioned for a tremendous project, with specific requests for software, which is completed to the great stated satisfaction of the client... only to discover that they haven't actually used what we've built. The mechanical failure of equipment and the hardship of repairs-people is a symptom. Training is a remedy, but sometimes it's for the wrong illness.