I work for an agency with thousands of employees. It's never like this. People do their work, they seek out the resources they need, and they self organize on short term teams to address issues. Traditional management structure exists to make sure no one is running in the wrong direction and to assess performance. "Just let me do my work" is basically what everyone wants, and a good manager will know/see that and be as hands-off as they can while still ensuring agency objectives are being appropriately accomplished.
