You've highlighted the problem - which is that management culture selects for ruthlessness and sociopathy, not for creative and organisational talent.

Occasionally you get someone with real creativity, but mostly you just get assholes. And they are ultimately responsible for the mediocrity of most organisations. They make noisy but poor decisions for personal reasons, and resist any change that inconveniences their personal ambitions and self-image.

I've been reading a history of Commodore, and at one point Jack Tramiel effectively destroys the brand by refusing to do a deal with a national computer distributor. He threw away the chance to compete with Apple and IBM because he refused to go into a partnership that threatened his aggressive one-up narcissism.

It's a persistent pattern. The story of Tramiel's companies is one of perma-drama, with constant swings between boom and bust. He was good at growing the pie up to a point, but not good at sharing to make the pie even bigger.