I don't think this is an easy reaction at all, I read it as someone who sees through the BS and has experienced it first-hand.

You call it grandstanding, I call it just being a good person and supporting your coworkers. Maybe a little 'grandstanding' is all that is needed to break a handful of beaten-down people out of their rut to stand up a little more and demand some attention. Shining light on these entrenched issues is the only way to get them to change. Shame works wonders. I agree with the parent post that more and more standing up is the only way to change. Someone just has to have the courage to do it first, job be damned. That grandstanding can go so much further if someone with the CTO title were to push things.

Things don't get more complicated the higher you go, they get easier, precisely because you're in the position of power and the influence, real or shadow, to actually have your words have meaning, and you have the entire body of experience and knowledge held by your people at your disposal upon which to draw. But that goes against the line of the C-suite knowing best and having some hidden knowledge.

> leadership empathy and rank and file business understanding inevitably break down

Because "leadership" are being cowards. Because they kept their teams at arm's length, not wanting anyone to get an up-close glimpse of how bad they're fumbling.

I don't know what ZIRP has to do with anything. If anything, we're in this mess because managers fell asleep at the wheel because they knew they didn't need to do jack diddly, the investments will always keep coming, no worries, no need to actually do their jobs, valuations will always rise, don't ya know!

> Things don't get more complicated the higher you go, they get easier, precisely because you're in the position of power and the influence, real or shadow, to actually have your words have meaning

Spoken like someone who's never been in a position of leading others. I'm not here to defend "leadership", there are good leaders and bad leaders, but scaling and influencing in a large organization is not a simple thing and if you don't acknowledge that then you're living in a fantasy world.