Some are able to * see * what a simple sketch will be. Perhaps not
each and every joint or screw hole but enough to confidently start
cutting wood.

I will  use James Krenov as an example.  Principally because I was
exposed to him and he is published and therefore what I say is in his
books.

I have a number of sketches done by him on bits of paper, several are
on the backs of photos of other unrelated pieces. The paper was just
handy when the 'spirit' caught him, I guess.  These sketches are so basic that they, IMOP,  would be next to useless by someone else.  A few horizontal and vertical lines and that is it. Yet cabinets that are acknowledged as works of art were built from such.

I say the ability to * see * a design beyond the 2 dimensional is a learned element for most.

  Even before I began my apprenticeship, I had been keeping a scrap book of pages torn from different Boating and Yachting magazines since I was 12 years old. Some designs just looked right.  Don't ask me how I knew, for surely I had no education to make such a judgement at that time. I just well, knew, that Design A was sweeter and fairer than Design B.  As I was formally exposed to the elements of small craft design, the vocabulary, I use that word in its broadest meaning, became clearer. I slowly began to see what it was in each scrapbook saved design that had led me to those early uneducated judgements.
To me it follows, that the beginner, the intermediate and even the advanced  will always use plans of some sort for 2 reasons. One, as a true step by step instructional for the project. Two, as a guide for experimentation for those advanced or adventuresome souls.