From first to "wurst": the erosion and implosion of German technology during WWII: the German management system, especially in terms of the technological industry, was a complex and convoluted bureaucratic nightmare

Air Force Journal of Logistics,  Summer, 2004  by Charles A. Pryor, III

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   Since 1945, the genesis of weapons by all four Allies has been
   dominated by the inheritance of Germany's wartime inventions.
   Indeed, the Korean War can be viewed, on the technical level, as a
   trial of strength between two different teams of Germans: those
   hired by America and those hired by the Soviet Union. The aerial
   dogfights between the Soviet MiG-15 and the American F-86
   Sabres--both designed by German engineers--dispelled for many their
   doubts about the expediency of plundering Germany's scientific
   expertise. (35)

Thus, the Germans did not lack grand and effective technological innovation. Yet, they were resoundingly unable to take advantage of this situation and were completely unable to bring these revolutionary concepts into operation. The reasons for this are manifold, but the centermost reason for their inability to exploit their technological superiority lay with the complex, convoluted, and inefficient management system in place in Germany during World War II.

Management for Dummies

One of the most overlooked practices in the business of technological innovation is the impact of management on the overall process. Management of technology is crucial to the successful implementation of revolutionary ideas and processes. Management needs to be not only knowledgeable about the designs and ideas of the engineers but also receptive to them. Management needs to provide a roadmap to what is to be accomplished. Without clear-cut direction, meaning a vision and goal not micromanagement, any technological advance is doomed to irrelevance. An overall strategy will provide the engineers with the proper vector to direct their abilities and ideas. Furthermore, management needs to provide clear and unambivalent boundaries to the efforts of the engineers to ensure the technological innovations and ideas stay focused and attainable. Finally, the management structure needs to be streamlined and simple to allow ideas to flow not only laterally but also vertically. Binding management to a complex and suffocating bureaucracy will have the same effect on the industry as a whole.

Alas, the Luftwaffe found itself in just such a predicament during the war. It had a complicated and convoluted approval process for the technological advances forwarded, one that was wasteful of not only resources but also time. It had little strategic direction and no boundaries on the effort to advance technology. It also had the wrong people in charge of the various agencies that headed up, collectively, the overall effort. The result was a host of revolutionary innovations that would have all but guaranteed they remained technologically superior but were doomed to be merely paper tigers by the bulging management process and poor leadership. These paper tigers were exploited by the Allied powers after the war, but the Luftwaffe was unable to take advantage of them. The overall operational result was an air force that ended the war with the same equipment with which it began, quality equipment at the start but obsolete in 1945 when compared with the equipment of the Allies.