Comment by Glyptodon

IMO this stuff happens frequently because the layers between engineers and users (IE product, project management, executive leadership) are crap and blaming the engineers for it.

Not that engineers can't be problematic. But product people who aren't technical enough and badly manage trade offs they don't understand or invent out of thin air outnumber engineers who are pigheaded know it alls more obsessed with technical minutae than product success.

Another one I see in the same ballpark is hiring a bunch of outsourced coders and then wondering why velocity and quality goes down. (Because you're multiplying the mythical man month effect by the skill difference between a day laborer from Home Depot and someone with significant skills/domain knowledge like a welder or electrician.)