I can't say for sure about those particular cases. I'd have to have a lot more detail. But as I mention elsewhere, one of the best ways to rise through the rank

I can't say for sure about those particular cases. I'd have to have a lot more detail. But as I mention elsewhere, one of the best ways to rise through the ranks, especially at companies excited to be unicorns, is to do dramatic things, even if they aren't particularly effective. ~20 years ago, when eBay was a company that mattered a great deal, I did a contract there. I was on some mailing list for the eng org where promotions were announced. Every single one of them talked about some incredible act of heroism, usually involving staying all night multiple times to get something out. The reality was that their code base was pretty poor, and their bad development practices caused things to get worse over time. That required heroics just to do pretty mundane stuff. And in that rush to meet arbitrary deadlines with sufficient drama? Even more corners would be cut, making it even harder something to get done next time. In contrast, they could have taken quality and productivity seriously and build their practices around that, ending up with a smooth-running process and reasonable hours for everybody. But that was in nobody's interest, because as far as I could tell nobody at eBay got promoted for quiet competence. Drama was what mattered, and so their development practices were tuned for creating opportunities for drama.