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ChrisHibbert comments on Bayesians vs. Barbarians - Less Wrong
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I think there's more contribution from the bottom up in a modern well-functioning military than you realize. One of the obstacles the US military's trainers face in teaching in other countries is getting officers to listen to their subordinates. In small units, successful leaders listen to their troops, in larger units, officers listen to their subordinates.
But in all those cases, there comes a time when the leader is giving orders, and at that point, the subordinates are trained to follow. The system doesn't work if it doesn't insist that the leader gets to decide when it is time to give orders.
But effectiveness comes from leaders who listen since, as you said, there are many more sensors at the edges of the org chart. The Culture is good at many things, but Banks doesn't show small-unit operations in which the leader gains by listening.
Ah, you miss what I was aiming at. The "sensory" ranks don't give orders. They're an upward ideas pump. Rank in the two modes is orthogonal. The "motor" ranks command as normal. High ranks in both listen, but to different things. The "motor" leader wants to know where the enemy are and if the men have a bright tactical idea. The "sensory" collator might be more interested in a clever strategic analysis, a way to shorten the supply chain, or a design for better field camouflage.
If I understand you, I think that's part of what is supposed to happen, though the communication is more lateral than I said at first. In addition to ideas going from the troops to their sergeants and from squad leaders to their commanders, new innovations spread from squad-to-squad.
After D-Day, the tactics required to get through narrow lanes surrounded by hedge rows were developed by individual tank teams, and tank groups picked up successful ideas from each other. In Iraq, methods for detecting ambushes and IEDs weren't developed at headquarters and promulgated from the top down, they arose as the result of experiment and spread virally.
There may be an advantage to having specialists who are looking for that kind of idea and for ways of spreading it, but I'd go with the modern management practice of empowering everyone and encouraging innovation by everyone who is in contact with the enemy. In business, it's good for morale, and in most arenas it multiplies the number of brains trying to solve problems and trying to steal good ideas.