Have you ever worked in construction?
Again, a non sequitur. Is there a point here?
The point is that it's easy to, from a distance, think that something is just like another thing. Without experience in a particular domain, you really don't know how things work. No two walls are alike.
It's still automation (which, as a concept, doesn't require being able to do multiple jobs, or even to do a single job from start to completion).
A mechanical system that frees a human from having to do do part of a job is already automation, and can still save tons of time and worker costs/effort. E.g. a system that automatically assembles 95% of a car door, and a human just has to come in at the end and attach some hard to automate part, is still better than the human having to assemble to whole door.