Director of Skunk Works

From the announcement e-mail:

"The purpose of this group is to prototype new technology that’s going to support our products and initiatives. It will be a small team of a programmer, an artist and a few designers. They’ll be working on special projects that we’ll launch in conjunction with new products, or big new initiatives. The Director of Skunk Works is going to be reporting to the CEO, and just about every group within the company is going to be working with Skunkworks in some capacity or another. Why the name? Well… the idea is to keep it small and focused on new ideas that will help look towards the future in this business and lead the pack, not follow other people’s ideas."


Leaving the obvious issues with institutionalizing skunk works aside (is it still skunk works if it's official?) this clearly is a dream job and very smart to encourage for every company. For instance the Miata convertible was a product of skunk works and Motorola's Razr was developed in a skunk work fashion -- I never heard of failed skunk works projects so it must always lead to great results(?). Let's turn everyhting in skunk works then -- be all skunk workers...