Excellent comment, Amy! I think you are right in many respects. But I have also seen many organizations where user research is not necessarily minimized, people beyond UX believe it is important, but the corporate machine cannot be stopped. So, you cut corners. You find out something great in research but are told it is out of scope. Or you water it down to make that release date. So, essentially what you are saying in your comment is true — we end up minimizing the research (i.e. conversations with the users). I think the people have the right idea and intentions but are not powerful enough to halt the gears of the machine.

It is, of course, far deeper than this. But for the sake of this comment, I think that sums it up.