The Magic Number of Direct Reports
Hello and welcome to Episode 143 of the People Powered Business Podcast!
Today is we are talking about something that can have such a huge impact on your sanity and your teams success. That is – how many direct reports can any one position handle?
I know in small business creating an organisational structure or org chart can feel like ‘overkill’ but without this structure things get messy, and when things are messy – they are ultimately hard!
That’s why I today’s episode I recommended everyone go back and listen to Episode 22 – The Value of a Clean Slate, and work through the clean slate exercise for their business.
Here is a link to Episode 22:
https://www.peoplepoweredbusiness.com.au/blog/clean-state
The reality is, the more people any one role needs to manage, the more positions reporting into any manager – the more time the management of those people takes and the less operational work they can do.
The most widely accepted ‘magic’ number is 7 - + or minus 2.
Effectively the maximum number of people any manager should manage is 7 – providing they are just managing and not doing other operational or client facing work.
This number is influenced though by a range of factors including:
- The complexity of the work;
- The experience level of the team;
- The acceptable error rate;
- The leadership experience of the manager; and
- The dynamic nature of the work environment.
All of these factors help us to assess whether the number is 7, or more than 7, or in most cases less than 7.
An Invitation:
If you’d like to connect with other businesses who are also navigating growing organisational teams, I’d love you to join us inside our free Facebook Group, HR Support for Australian Businesses, so I can learn more about what’s working for you and any challenges you might be having.
Join Here.