As a "lowly" NCO-- a plain old Sergeant even-- I was given the commanders intent by the unit I was in Direct Support (DS) of, and had the authority to make the decisions on how I would execute that intent.

Many other militaries, the way it works is the commander says "You go here, do this, and report".

Instead, it was me who told the commander "I'll be here, doing this, and I'll let you know if anything funny happens." If I thought I needed to move, I moved and reported it, I didn't have to call on the radio and say "Sir, request permission to relocate to the alternate position that was provided to me."

Now, I know that I made a pretty global pronouncement up there, and there are a billion exceptions to every blanket-statement. I don't intend it to mean that the enlisted ranks in other militaries are incapable of doing their jobs or thinking for themselves. It means, that in my observations, the way we structure ourselves and execute our Standard Operating Procedures are different.