Yeah but the author's message is... Problematic. Warping the way you talk because of a creepy manager/engineering culture is not healthy.

Anyway the engineers don't say 'this would take an hour to fix and it's worth X to do it'. It's all intuitive! 'this is really annoying so the team agrees to do it soon'. It's not about being a perfect utilitarian robot it's about being productive and having a good life.

I believe in a balance. Spending 1 hour for the task mentioned in the article is something that should just be done without having to ask for approval.

But knowing what to do and when to ask for "approval", requires that we are aligned with the business, so that we can make these decisions in the context of "the greater good". If not, the business may decide to take away these privileges and start micro managing.

I wish our management understand that. Even getting basic cables and adapters can be a kafkaesque battle that requires endless justification. I never thought that this is what it would be like working at a FAANG. Fwiw, I worked at different FAANG and they had a self serve kiosk with free cables and adapters. It was way more efficient.