OBM is like treating everyone in the company as a manager or partner. The results have often been amazing. Companies bogged down in unsuccessful productivity or quality campaigns have been given a new lease of life by OBM.

"Huddles" are a central feature. This is a form of team working and team briefing, but goes 360 degrees so management gets back the information. In "prehuddles" teams analyse performance (using productivity, quality and financial measures) and communicate upwards. In "main huddles" managers receive performance information, as do shop floor teams. In "post huddles" middle managers are briefed on performance objectives, and then in turn brief team leaders. So it is a form of Hoshin planning, except that it happens frequently with a cycle being completed at least weekly. This is about generating continuous powerful feedback loop.

Jack Stack refers to OBM as "the great game of business", He identifies three essential steps: creating a series of small wins, giving employees a sense of the big picture, and teaching the numbers (including financials). He believes that business should be fun and that gains are best made in a series of small games or wins. These wins or objectives are communicated weekly through the huddles, and are celebrated.

Stack describes what he calls the "myths of management": that telling the truth or sharing the position or numbers is dangerous (more dangerous not to share, and we are all committed so why tell outsiders?), nice guys finish last (bosses who act like SOB's don't last), a manager has to come up with the answers (they can't; everyone has to participate), and others. So OBM represents real empowerment, not just talk.