A lot of things exist in this game due to player demands. Not necessarily because the developers want to push a certain playstyle.

You haven gotten to the point where you are arbitrarily deciding what's a developer's intent is or not.

I suggest rereading the developer insights if you are looking for this. In fact, here is a good quote from trading where they are literally discussing IVs and trading with higher level friends:

"In other words, as your Friendship level increases with a friend, you’ll have a better chance of receiving a strong Pokémon when trading." https://pokemongolive.com/en/post/jundevupdate-trading/

"Strong" is a pretty clear indicator of intent of IVs and they highlight it as a design philosophy of how they structured trading.