[timhrothgar]

Completely agreed. The credible threat of termination drives employees to perform even if they also misbehave in other ways (e.g. CYA and office politics). Consider the Lesson of the Concubines by Sun Tzu:

"Sun Tzu then set the women a simple drill and made sure they understood what to do. However, when he started ordering them to perform the drill, the women burst out in laughter. He tried again with the same result. Sun Tzu claimed that this failure of the troops to obey was the fault of the commanders. So, despite the warlord’s pleas, he ordered the two concubines beheaded as an example for the rest of the company. Thereafter, the women did not utter a single sound and performed the drill exactly as commanded."

This is a depiction of Amazon. However, a "simple drill" is not high speed software engineering.