This sounds to me like placing too much of a burden on individuals. In general, when dealing with people of at least average competence, when things go wrong, I

This sounds to me like placing too much of a burden on individuals. In general, when dealing with people of at least average competence, when things go wrong, I blame process, not people. Software engineering will probably mostly provide what the market requires and rewards, and for most things where you don't have lives at stake, it takes a lot of cash and process to drive your defect rate toward zero. Viewed through an economic lens, an economist would say that we have an optimum level of environmental pollution, where the marginal benefit of cleaning it up or preventing it doesn't surpass the marginal cost of tolerating it. So, I disagree. Work will get done to the necessary standard, and our industry already fetishizes overwork and heroes. I don't think anyone should bothering driving themselves crazy with extreme personal perfectionism when the market doesn't demand or reward it, and the software engineering field doesn't gear itself toward producing those results via process.