It's more about professionalism and stricter standards of engineering and less about being "good despite bad context". You can hire the best artisans for your

It's more about professionalism and stricter standards of engineering and less about being "good despite bad context". You can hire the best artisans for your pot making company and make some of the best pots. However, sooner or later you will encounter problems like disparate outcomes of quality (due to different people having different standards of style, crafting and discipline), unpredictability and reliability. An engineer role is to standardize processes and turn things like quality into a predictable outcome. It's not just about being good and not being bad.