> It makes me so uncomfortable to watch, and to imagine the culture that might well have embraced this.
I've seen it happen and... it doesn't even need to be a culture, just a high-up exec who had a "genius idea", and showed it to his cat who purred, so he decided to run with it.
Now the culture around tends not to be fantastic, but you only need one person with a debatable sense of everything and high-enough up the chain that he can push stuff without any oversight (let alone undersight from those working under him)
I've seen it happen and... it doesn't even need to be a culture, just a high-up exec who had a "genius idea", and showed it to his cat who purred, so he decided to run with it.
Now the culture around tends not to be fantastic, but you only need one person with a debatable sense of everything and high-enough up the chain that he can push stuff without any oversight (let alone undersight from those working under him)