Is bad management a common problem in corporate structures in general?

Yes, and it comes about by believing the very stupid belief that being good at something means that you will automatically be a good manager.

Take a simple example: a car mechanic is an absolute genius with fixing engines. So the garage makes him a foreman. Why? What is the mental gymnastics behind the thinking that because someone is good at handling cars, they'll automatically be good at handling people?

And sadly the managers believe it too.

But this idiocy is rife.

How has this happened? Because of the Peter Principle. Imagine an organisation filled with good managers and they promote someone to management who is a bad manager. This happens because no system is perfect so errors will occur. If the bad manager isn't removed, they will also pick bad managers underneath them. This will also erode the management ability of those above them simply by the fact that it will be a drain on resources to correct the consequences of the bad management decisions. This will affect other management decisions which will perpetuate more bad management. As the situation worsens, the good managers will leave for other organisation and be replaced by bad managers simply because bad managers won't want good managers who will show them up and good managers won't want to work with bad managers. This will breed more bad managers until the entire organisation is swamped.

The solution is horribly simple: you create an operations manual

Take the example above. You get the mechanic to document his work. That gives you a guide to give to the other mechanics

The foreman also documents their work. Then when the existing foreman is on holiday, you make the mechanic an Acting Foreman. All they have to do is follow the manual or make amendments if the manual is insufficient. If they do well, you can consider making it permanent sometime in the future. It they don't do well, you may give the title "Chief Mechanic" and send the hard work to them which is what they would prefer doing with the day anyway.

And even though writing was invented thousands of years ago, is taught in schools and is the root of civilisation, people treat this advice like I've just suggested that they poke their eyes out with a sharp stick.

The usual pathetic excuse is

"I haven't got time to write things down. I'm busy" to which I reply,

"Then get an intern to follow you around making notes while you dictate to them what you're doing. Problem solved"