Work is delivering value.

Yes, we have craftsmanship, but at the end of the day everything is ephemeral and impermanent and the world continues on without remembering us.

I think both the IC and executive are correct in superposition.

Indeed. Even the ur-craftsman, John Carmack, says that delivering value to customers is pretty much the only thing that matters in development. If AI lets you do that faster, cheaper, you'd be a fool not to use it. There's a reason why it's virtually a must in professional software engineering now.