Not a whim, an existential crisis. Justifying their existence, cherry picking suitable answers from a ton of data to back that up. Confirmation bias to appear relevant.
Justifying their job too. How do you get marks on your review if the only concrete things you can point to through the year are the bookkeeping of the design world? Also, employee turnover and position changes means that those new people bring their own, "new" ideas that have to be implemented(how else do you "make your mark"?), at the expense of the user comfort/satisfaciton.