> I don't know if you're being deliberately obtuse or argumentative.

I refer you to the guidelines: https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html

> because I was a generalist they had confidence that I could pick up the manuals and figure it out

Why you though? That's the point I'm making. Of course a smaller company with limited resources may have to repurpose existing employees. But when a BigCo with a massive budget needs to do something new, they can assign existing employees with the closest expertise, hire new employees with relevant expertise, or acquire other companies. It's unclear why a generalist with no domain expertise would be preferable.