Your making assumptions here. There's no details on what exactly was needed from an engineering perspective. Was it design? Was it merely the knowledge to work the tools? She hired this person, but would any engineer have worked? If all he did was follow instructions and a plan and build what she designed then he was a lackey. Now he may have been more then that. But all the information I've seen so far has pointed to her being the designer, her being the driving force for this.