> "If engineering hasn't helped them not kill most of their products, what is it helping do?"
Engineering does not set direction, they just build what they're told to. There are entire product management, market research, and similar teams that help senior management decide what to build. This is the case at most large software companies.
Yes, direction can be set independent of engineering. But a string of failures, at best, shows a string of misused engineering resources. Which just leads back to my challenge of why do they think they know what a successfull candidate is?
Engineering does not set direction, they just build what they're told to. There are entire product management, market research, and similar teams that help senior management decide what to build. This is the case at most large software companies.