I've worked with a lot of brilliant people who know how to do the paperwork that they have to do, and then they do it. Don't believe me? Check out the paperwork that medical doctors have to do -- it's insane, and what these researchers are being asked to do (assuming it's admins who get laid off) is way less. Or how about software developers? We have to dot our i's and cross our t's all over the place -- design reviews, architecture reviews, code reviews, test writing, and lots of process, and then we get to maintain and debug our own code and sometimes even operate it.
