Sometimes they have checkboxes to tick in some compliance document and they must run the software that let them tick those checkboxes, no exceptions, because those compliances allow the company to be on the market. Regulatory captures, etc.

Believe me, the average Fortune 500 CEO does not know or care what “SSL MITM” is, or whether passwords should contain symbols and be changed monthly, or what the difference is between ‘VPN’ and ‘Zero Trust’.

They delegate that stuff. To the corporate IT department.

But they also say "Here, this is Sarah your auditor. Answer these questions and resolve the findings." - every year

It's all CyberSecurity insurance compliance that in many cases deviates from security best practices.

This is where the problems come from. Auditors are definitely what ultimately causes IT departments to make dumb decisions.

For example, we got dinged on an audit because instead of using RSA4096, we used ed25519. I kid you not, their main complaint was there wasn't enough bits which meant it wasn't secure.

Auditors are snake oil salesman.

This is 100% it- the auditor is confirming the system is configured to a set of requirements, and those requirements are rarely in lockstep with actual best practices.