I am not sure he is a people person. He probably has good rapport with higher-ups but if people routinely bypassed him to take advice from OP that means he is clearly not valued by others in team. Once OP leaves his tech incompetence would be shown up and would lead to more devs leaving the job. These are the kind of 'people person' who hamper productivity and eventually lead to team dissolution. Although I agree he is clever enough to jump ship before that.