Nowadays, world-class companies have and eliminated management hierarchies to cut costs, improve quality, and become more responsive to customers. The blueprint to accomplish this was the best-selling forerunner to this book, LEAN TRANSFORMATION. Becoming a lean enterprise has fundamentally changed how people in these businesses are expected to operate. Rather than superiors telling subordinates what to do, and subordinates doing it, they must get things done by working on empowered teams comprised of peers from other departments. A difficulty many in lean enterprises face is they are expected to get more done with fewer resources than they had before. Administrative support, for example, has gone the way of the buggy whip. Since "work flows toward competency unless abated" a few individuals end up doing it all. It's no surprise, or secret, they're overworked. But this doesn't have to be. This book explains in simple, everyday language a process anyone, regardless of inherent leadership skills, can use to spread out the work, create a sense of urgency and accountability, and get everyone pulling their own weight.