To be blunt, it’s managers all the way to the top. Every dumb thing a middle manager has ever said to you was caused by a dumb thing their manager told them needed to happen. My previous job was a middle management position where I was finally making decent money, but the amount of bullshit I had to shield my guys from was just too much for me, and at the end of the day I’d still have to require them to do some dumb shit that they hated because it was mandated by my OWN bosses. I quit that job because everyone above my level was a completely inhuman piece of shit and I couldn’t morally justify working for them, and also I didn’t want to be the bad guy.