Absolutely, any position within a corporation should be automated if it makes sense and improves the performance of the company as a whole. The original purchasers of the shares served the purpose of providing money to the corporation, the subsequent purchasers are participating in a secondary market and help in adjusting the value of the corporation's shares. The corporation can benefit from this by issuing new shares to generate further funding. Voting shares also provide input from outside the company which can be a healthy perspective to have especially when it is coming from serious analysts who spend a lot of time looking at other corporations in the same industry, it can be detrimental as well but because the share owners have skin in the game they are less likely to vote against their own interests and those with the most interest have the most votes.
I have nothing against employee owned corporations. If people want to get together and run and work for their own corporation then more power to them. I don't think it should be the only type of corporation though, we need a variety of models to adapt to changing circumstances and service different needs.