You fired your top talent. I hope you’re happy
There were a lot of failures in the Rick story "on all sides" as POTUS would say. This author seems to identify with Rick and frames this type of developer as gifted, but taken advantage of. At the end of the day, we all have to manage our own careers. And in this field that especially includes "managing your manager". Whatever process you find yourself in, you have to be able to push back and say: "I'm working on X, if you want me to work on Y, what do you want first? What's the priority?"If you find yourself in the pitiable position of fielding calls from Sales, Marketing, and Support, you need to get out of that situation by appealing to the CEO/CTO or someone. You have to have a buffer between these groups and development. If this doesn't exist or you can't get it, go elsewhere.