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Gillick was legendary at being absent from the corporate office, burning up miles, crisscrossing the country, missing Christmas with his family, to stay personally connected to players. John Schneider, by all accounts, has a similar approach. He is on the ground watching and talking with the players himself.
This hands-on, ground-level, workaholic approach yields a number of benefits (despite what it may do to a guy's family). One of the biggest ones - to which I attribute much of Gillick's success - is that the GM will get a sense of the personality of a player. And then he can determine if a high-performance player might dwindle in new circumstances, or if a low-performance player is just in the wrong environment. You build a stronger team by having compatible personalities and avoiding guys who just won't fit in.
Gillick would know exactly if Montero was a fit, or not, and he would either be trading him now, or have him up with the major league team.
One thing I recall reading about Schneider, is he often asks players about other players. IIRC this is part of why he acquired Chris Clemons, based on what other players said about him. It makes me think that this is still an under-used scouting tool. If I was the M's GM, and I was trying to decide which bat to go hard after, I'd ask Felix. Which of the three guys I'm looking at does he think is the toughest out? Recall that when Felix pitched to some minor leaguers in spring training a few years back, he singled out Kyle Seager as the toughest of the guys who faced him - he was impressed. That impression seems to have projected well.