Yes! My problem with the "CEOs make big decisions so they should get paid a lot" thing is that it encourages CEOs to set up companies where they make all the big decisions. And of course to draw all the attention to themselves. And to focus everybody on trying to figure out what the CEO wants, rather than what the customers want.
Contrast that with, say, 3M. The Post-it Note was a bottom-up invention. One guy came up with the adhesive. Another person figure out what to do with it. They've sold billions of dollars worth of the stuff. As far as I'm concerned, that makes the 3M CEOs much smarter than the hands-on ones. Instead of treating the company like a giant prosthesis, they created an ecology.
Contrast that with, say, 3M. The Post-it Note was a bottom-up invention. One guy came up with the adhesive. Another person figure out what to do with it. They've sold billions of dollars worth of the stuff. As far as I'm concerned, that makes the 3M CEOs much smarter than the hands-on ones. Instead of treating the company like a giant prosthesis, they created an ecology.