5 ms·

What is an healthy manager-to-ic ratio?

by alanfranz 3y ago

deleted 3y ago
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- deleted 3y ago
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542458 3y ago
I feel it depends on a lot of factors, such as how senior your ICs are, how interlinked their tasks are, how complex the domain is, how large the project is, what the rate of attrition is, how complex the organization’s established procedures are… An organization that has nothing but fairly senior researchers working on separate projects might need little management. An organization with lots of more junior engineers working on something like a rocket (where every part depends on every other part) might need more overhead.
rcme 3y ago
Regardless of what the healthy ratio is, managers are typically incentivized to add more managers between themselves and their reports. This creates the illusion that they are more senior and worth of a promotion to senior manager, director, VP, etc. so even if your company has a healthy ratio, there needs to be a force counteracting the natural desire of managers to grow their ranks.
dangus 3y ago
I don't know about a minimum but I think 10 is a good upper limit. Unrelated, I think that we should stop calling workers individual contributors. I think "workers" is a more fitting description. "Individual contributor" makes the worker seem smaller and less impactful, as if management is contributing in a way that's superior and bigger than the individual. In reality, only the workers work, and managers manage, doing less work the higher up on the ladder they go. Don't believe me? Here's a list of CEOs that somehow managed to be CEO of multiple companies at once. - Jack Dorsey - Jeff Bezos - Elon Musk - Carlos Ghosn And yet, my employer forbids me from having more than one day job.
23B1 3y ago
The concept of "span of control," sometimes called the management ratio, is the number of direct reports controlled directly by a leader or a manager. The concept was developed in the UK by Sir Ian Hamilton in his book The Soul and Body of an Army, in the 1920s. It arose from the assumption that managers have finite amounts of time and energy to spend with their people and their jobs. Analyzing British military leaders, Hamilton found that the leaders could not effectively control more than 3-6 people. These figures have been generally accepted as the "rule of thumb" for span of control ever since, at least in the military where the bulk of my management experience lies.
- umeshunni 3y ago
  3-6 sounds like a good rule of thumb. Research that I have seen hints that people who were in I shaped teams (i.e. single person reporting to a manager) and V shaped teams (2 people reporting to a manager) were much unhappier than larger teams. Similarly, somewhere close to 10 is when the there is just not enough 'managing' or mentorship happening. I have seen that work only in cases where most of the ICs are senior/staff level and are effectively self-managing.
taneq 3y ago
It varies depending on the specifics, but I’ve seen 1:7 work well across multiple industries. Anything routine enough to need less oversight is automated, and anything needing more oversight is either cutting edge research or isn’t hiring experienced enough staff.
clarle 3y ago
Netflix uses “between six to twelve “ in its most recent culture document. https://jobs.netflix.com/culture https://jobs.netflix.com/culture
adrr 3y ago
Depends on what the role of manager is. Lots of orgs push their best talent into management so they are also expected to do IC and also manage. My belief is there should be a separate but with equal pay track for ICs and you push your best ICs into that track. Ratios between of one manager to 10 to 20 ICs. Also there is benefit of flat orgs which comes with higher ratio in terms of meeting reduction and also communication efficiency both top down and bottom up.
Eumenes 3y ago
4-6 imo

What is an healthy manager-to-ic ratio?

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]

542458 3y ago

I feel it depends on a lot of factors, such as how senior your ICs are, how interlinked their tasks are, how complex the domain is, how large the project is, what the rate of attrition is, how complex the organization’s established procedures are… An organization that has nothing but fairly senior researchers working on separate projects might need little management. An organization with lots of more junior engineers working on something like a rocket (where every part depends on every other part) might need more overhead.

rcme 3y ago

Regardless of what the healthy ratio is, managers are typically incentivized to add more managers between themselves and their reports. This creates the illusion that they are more senior and worth of a promotion to senior manager, director, VP, etc. so even if your company has a healthy ratio, there needs to be a force counteracting the natural desire of managers to grow their ranks.

dangus 3y ago

I don't know about a minimum but I think 10 is a good upper limit. Unrelated, I think that we should stop calling workers individual contributors. I think "workers" is a more fitting description. "Individual contributor" makes the worker seem smaller and less impactful, as if management is contributing in a way that's superior and bigger than the individual. In reality, only the workers work, and managers manage, doing less work the higher up on the ladder they go. Don't believe me? Here's a list of CEOs that somehow managed to be CEO of multiple companies at once. - Jack Dorsey - Jeff Bezos - Elon Musk - Carlos Ghosn And yet, my employer forbids me from having more than one day job.

23B1 3y ago

The concept of "span of control," sometimes called the management ratio, is the number of direct reports controlled directly by a leader or a manager. The concept was developed in the UK by Sir Ian Hamilton in his book The Soul and Body of an Army, in the 1920s. It arose from the assumption that managers have finite amounts of time and energy to spend with their people and their jobs. Analyzing British military leaders, Hamilton found that the leaders could not effectively control more than 3-6 people. These figures have been generally accepted as the "rule of thumb" for span of control ever since, at least in the military where the bulk of my management experience lies.

umeshunni 3y ago
3-6 sounds like a good rule of thumb. Research that I have seen hints that people who were in I shaped teams (i.e. single person reporting to a manager) and V shaped teams (2 people reporting to a manager) were much unhappier than larger teams. Similarly, somewhere close to 10 is when the there is just not enough 'managing' or mentorship happening. I have seen that work only in cases where most of the ICs are senior/staff level and are effectively self-managing.

taneq 3y ago

It varies depending on the specifics, but I’ve seen 1:7 work well across multiple industries. Anything routine enough to need less oversight is automated, and anything needing more oversight is either cutting edge research or isn’t hiring experienced enough staff.

clarle 3y ago

Netflix uses “between six to twelve “ in its most recent culture document. https://jobs.netflix.com/culture https://jobs.netflix.com/culture

adrr 3y ago

Depends on what the role of manager is. Lots of orgs push their best talent into management so they are also expected to do IC and also manage. My belief is there should be a separate but with equal pay track for ICs and you push your best ICs into that track. Ratios between of one manager to 10 to 20 ICs. Also there is benefit of flat orgs which comes with higher ratio in terms of meeting reduction and also communication efficiency both top down and bottom up.

Eumenes 3y ago

4-6 imo