Why was Richard Hamming a Bell Labs department head with no reports?

Brian Kernighan said Dick Hamming worked hard to get the title of department head at Bell Labs while having no one report to him. The title carried clout he could use, since people at the wrong level in an organization get ignored, but it spared him the administrative work of managing staff. Kernighan noted that the rank showed in small ways, such as the carpet on Hamming's office floor and his listing in the phone book.

• Kernighan said Hamming joined Bell Labs around 1946 and was among the first to see computing as central to future research.
• Hamming predicted that more than half of research work would one day be done by computing rather than in physical labs, and was laughed at for it.

Source: our own transcription of the episode. The full conversation is on Ryan Peterman (2026-11-05). Read the whole episode summary →

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