"Law of Jante" (jantelagen) is a double edged sword and can work in favour of innovation. In good cases, it means both subordinates and bosses intuitively understand that titles are theatre, and anyone can present new ideas and challenge old ideas.

>German education has a big emphasis on bowing down to authority from early age

Ah, good ol' legacy of the education system implemented by Prussia, who wanted an army of conformist soldiers following orders, and not free thinkers risking to upset the apple cart. Great mentality if all you want is waging war though :)

And this mentality persist to this day, where given a set of rules, other successful related cultures like Dutch, Brits or Swedes will first use common sense when interpreting and applying them, whereas Germans will tend to blindly follow those rules by the book even if they don't make sense in that specific context.

It's difficult to uproot people from their ways, when they've only lived in Plato's cave allegory.