Sorry for the wall of text; my phone browser does not enjoy inserting line breaks.
It's unfortunate, but in my experience in corporate America, critical thinking is looked down upon. The message is always to be a good little soldier and don't question anything. At one company, we were literally told not to analyze data for new patterns even thought it was done when there was no other work, and Research and Analytics were too swamped to do it. We were saving $30k-$45k a day in wasted ads, but I was told to stop it because "it's just not part of your department's duties."
Problem solvers were never rewarded. Instead, when the engineer stayed an extra 4 hours everyday for weeks to get a project launched early, it's the account managers who are given cruise tickets and thousands in bonuses. Literally, once the contract is signed, all client contact was through my department. The account manager would come back into the picture on the day of the launch. Once in a while, the account managers would give the superstar person/team a Papa Johns pizza. It is a horrible feeling to see potential and intelligence in people you oversee, but are powerless to harness their ability due to procedure, or properly reward them for unexpectedly potent solutions.
It's easy to see why it would be easier to avoid critically thinking and embrace routine and surface understanding instead.
I know companies aren't all like that; my husband workplace is fantastic for fostering creativity and critical thinking. However, I tend to feel more companies than not are stifling.