"Overall, I believe the computer age favors the individual and that resistance to the individual work style is the last gasp of the dying industrial age. Many software companies put their faith in committees because they believe this is the way things have always been done. In fact, most unique modern achievements have been the product of individuals or very small groups, including relativity theory, the airplane, the laser and the computer itself.
Until now, individual achievement has been exceptional in a mass society, even though the exceptions often transform that society. The deliberate cultivation of individual creativity may end up being the most important social result of computer technology. Either that, or cottage programmers like myself will simply have more time to cultivate our gardens. "<p>This is a view I hold but very rarely hear expressed in my day to day working environment where committees of people from various organisations work together to agree or disagree on plans that are always proposed by one, or very few, individuals. The majority, even in a committee environment, are superfluous from the perspective of productivity, though not from the perspective of governance.