Obviously, then, you need a Guildsman piloting the ship, tripping on spice and foreseeing the obstacles.

I work there (FTE) and this is complete nonsense. The managers may be working themselves to death, but individual contributors are not, except in cases of extreme inefficiency. The company wants you to produce results, not to kill yourself and waste the money spent training you. They take the work-life balance thing seriously nowadays, regardless of how things used to be when this stereotype first was cast. The most cynical thing you can say about this is that you can't burn out your employees in a competitive job market or when you aren't compensating them with soaring stock values.

With all that said, I agree that it is exceeding lame to cancel the pub plan.