There was a time, believe it or not, when Senior Oficers actually sought the opinions of Junior Officers because they were the people doing the job.
I can remember the then AOCinC specifying that I would be the Captain of a specific task so that we could "Discuss" various matters that had come to his attention. My (Navigator) Flt Cdr came along to provide top cover.
The discussion lasted for some 6-8 hours over 2 days and there was absolutely no adverse come back from the AOCinC.
The crew, however, felt that somewhere other than Vagar would have been a better choice of nightstop!!