I haven't been in the military myself, and I'd be curious to hear perspective from someone who's been in both environments. I think in the military there is a methodology where at each level you break up your goal into fairly independent sub-goals, communicate those sub-goals to sub-teams with an accompanying expectation of autonomy in execution, and allow them to do the same for their sub-teams. In a civilian situation, one doesn't normally have that level of clarity available, either in the goals or in the org structure. And I suspect the military culture is also less effective when it is dealing with a goal that isn't clearly defined.