Someone who politics for more time (with some aptitude) will generally beat out someone who doesn't.

One of the marks in favor of being cutthroat about pre-registering KPIs and expected outcomes, and then evaluating solely based on them.

In the end, I think it comes down to organizational culture.

The companies I've seen with healthier executive ranks all had a very strong culture/tradition of "brook no bullshit" and shunned/discouraged up and coming colleagues from doing the same. As well as a focus on a central, objective mission (e.g. "Does this help us X?").

You still got bad apples, but their behavior wasn't nearly as pervasive as I've seen other places.