It's also about lack of leadership and (true) strategy. Many large organizations just careen from "crisis" to "crisis" and are extremely reactive; lacking a long term strategy and clear plan, it becomes extremely hard to actually make decisions.

People endlessly defer because they don't want to be the person to "take the blame" for a decision. Making decisions when you don't connect them to an actual goal/plan/vision becomes a liability. The solution is endless meetings where liability is distributed to...everyone in the meeting. It's successful, in a way, but also exhausting and makes you feel like your job involves just tilting at windmills (imaginary crises).