It is a little different because the bulk of their compensation is often in shares or options to buy shares. These are often structured in a way such that they are "free" money. If you have a company with a hundred million shares outstanding, you can make 500,000 new shares and only dilute the total value of the company a little but still add to an employee's net worth quite a bit.
Well he helped build google maps. That's a decent example of how small teams can create large value over enough time.
Another example: the original tablet at Apple was built by one guy. Sharp people can focus on good investments and generate disproportional returns, even if they didn't do the work directly.
