FWIW, I agree with your overall notion of where one should go, but it's worth noting that you're describing an extremely optimistic world for probably 90% to 95% of shops. Which is not to say that it's a bad idea at all to get there, but incremental steps are important and they're what I feel are being described in this article (setting aside that that kind of pervasive automation wasn't really a thing outside of bleeding-edge shops at the time he was describing).

Shameless plug for people who are feeling inferior while reading this thread: as it happens, my consulting gigs revolve pretty heavily around doing exactly what 'jedberg has described, and it's super worth getting to that point. ;) Email's in the profile if you're looking to get there.