when companies get too big, the C-level executives lose visibility about what the needs of the actual users are and instead

I think that cycle is universal. As any organization or group becomes increasingly stratified the decision makers at the top lose any connection to the foundations of prosperity that allowed to to grow and stratify in the first place.

I imagine it like a city on a mountain. As the city grows wealth and status concentrate at the top. That’s normal and beneficial at small scales. But at a certain point the top moves above the cloud layer and can no longer see the base of the mountain. After that point those at the top start to forget how the mountain works and believe the cloud layer is part of the structure and their decisions become increasingly disconnected from any reality below that cloud layer.

And our globally connected society keeps those above the cloud layer in closer contact to the tops of other mountains than to the base of their own.