Are the metal retaining clips behind iPhone 7 buttons important?

I'm doing a project soon of swapping my matte black housing to a red one and I've been learning how to do it and noticed that in all of the videos that a small metal retaining clip has to be removed before the home and volume buttons can be taken out. (Step 87 and 88 on iFixit's rear case replacement guide). Is this clip needed? As everyone that i've seen do this procedure has bent the clips and i'm not sure how easily they would fit back in?

Thanks, Nick