In my own attempt to answer that question, I thought a short walk down memory lane was in order. Historically, the results have been mixed when founders hang onto their leadership roles. In this continuum of famous founder-CEOs, see if you can figure out where Sun CEO Scott McNealy should be placed.

In the still-large-and-in-charge category is Michael Dell. Although the company has its critics, Dell's control of the company he founded 19 years ago has served Dell, Inc. well. During one of the longest high-tech slumps in recent history, Dell not only remained profitable when its competitors did not, but distanced itself from the rest of the pack.

In the make-room-at-the-top category are leaders that hang-on as chairman, but who relinquished control of the day-to-day operations to a new CEO or president. Generally speaking, nothing negative about the companies' prospects precipitated these changes. Most notable of these are Bill Gates and Andy Grove. In spite of the recent security missteps, the Microsoft juggernaut continues to roll on. Although Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates stepped aside in early 2000 to let Steve Ballmer assume the job of CEO, as the chairman of Microsoft's board of directors and chief software architect, Gates still plays a commanding role 25 years after he and now venture capitalist and sports franchise mogul Paul Allen founded the company.

Then there's Grove. Despite his retreat from the limelight, Intel co-founder Andy Grove is still the chairman of that company's board 35 years after he started the company with Robert Noyce and Gordon Moore (the "Moore" in "Moore's Law). Grove was both CEO and president and eventually handed off those responsibilities to the company's current chief executive and president Craig Barrett.

In the "Welcome Back Kotter" category, are Ted Waitt and Steve Jobs. Much the way the Grove and Gates changes were structured, Ted Waitt, who founded Gateway in 1985 after his grandmother secured a $10,000 loan for him, stayed on as chairman of Gateway's board, but turned over his CEO responsibilities to Jeffrey Weitzen at the end of 1999. But barely a year passed when, in the beginning of 2001, Waitt came back as CEO to resume control of day-to-day operations and attempt to reverse Gateway's downward slide. Today, the company, which in recent weeks has announced more than a thousand layoffs, is still struggling to return to profitability. Under Waitt's direction, 2003 has been about reinvention for Gateway. The company continues to move itself closer to the nexus where computers and consumer electronics converge-- a spot where the other Welcome-Back-Kotter CEO, Steve Jobs, has made great inroads.

In 1976, Jobs and Apple co-founder Steve "the Woz" Wozniak founded Apple Computer. In 1983, Chairman Jobs handed the keys to the CEO and president's office to then Pepsi president John Sculley and the men butted heads for two years until 1985 when Jobs resigned after failing to squeeze Sculley out. But 11 years later, as part of Apple's acquisition of NeXT, Jobs returned and the rest isn't just history. In the personal computing industry where many have questioned whether there's any room left for innovation, Apple is still the poster child for ease of everything, including convergence of computing and personal electronics.

Then there's the The-Captain-Goes-Down-with-the-Ship category, and the two pole-sitting founders are Wang Laboratories' An Wang and the former leader of DEC to whom I've heard some compare Sun's McNealy: Ken Olsen. Both were brilliant, old school founders of digital revolution giants that had difficulty keeping with the pace of technological and managerial evolution. Both rode their companies to stardom on the basis of significant technological achievement. Both ignored the subsequent Darwinian change happening around them (as well as conventional wisdom) and stayed put in their thrones long after those thrones turned into sleds speeding down the slippery slope of their companies' precipitous declines. By the time Wang and Olsen stepped aside, the graves of Wang and DEC had already been dug and the historians would eventually chronicle the disasters (DEC is Dead, Long Live DEC, Riding the Runaway Horse: The Rise and Decline of Wang Laboratories) perhaps in hopes of keeping history from repeating itself.

So, can you spot McNealy?