I think the key insight is that a CEO with a background in the field, and who loves the field - such as James Daunt who became B&N's CEO but has a background as

I think the key insight is that a CEO with a background in the field, and who loves the field - such as James Daunt who became B&N's CEO but has a background as a bookstore owner - can do better than your average MBA. This is perhaps the passage from the article that resonated the most with me: > If you want to sell music, you must love those songs. If you want to succeed in journalism, you must love those newspapers. If you want to succeed in movies, you must love the cinema. > But this kind of love is rare nowadays. I often see record labels promote new artists for all sorts of gimmicky reasons—even labels I once trusted such as Deutsche Grammophon or Concord. I’ve come to doubt whether the people in charge really love the music.