The author makes a telling comment about how "worker-bee" programmers can be reassigned that displays the same contempt for developers as the managers who call

The author makes a telling comment about how "worker-bee" programmers can be reassigned that displays the same contempt for developers as the managers who call them "resources". Call it a pet peeve, I guess. One other factor to consider is that if a company were to do multiple acquisitions and consistently behave this way (immediately lay off every manager of the "losing" internal product), it would likely create a not-very-healthy culture of fear and opposition to acquisitions. That's not to say, of course, that underperforming managers should get a break "just because". Rather, it seems reasonable to say that their performance and future roles should be re-evaluated along with every other affected party's - and yes, they probably shouldn't end up leading the newly acquired team a la Collabra. (Keep in mind that sometimes the internal product's lack of success is quite often due to senior management's decisions... the same senior management that makes the decision to acquire).