Being a leader has never been harder. The work is more complex. Team engagement remains at multi-year lows, and according to this article the average American manager now leads a team of 12, up from 8.2 in 2013.
I understand the drivers for increased spans of control. Cost savings are the biggest and longest running driver. Those savings are easy to see on a spreadsheet. The costs of an overloaded manager show up later – in disengagement and turnover. Gallup estimates that replacing one employee costs one-half to two times that person's annual salary. It doesn't take many resignations from a team of 12 to wipe out what you saved by cutting the manager role. The more recent “reason” for flattening organizational structures is the rise of AI with the promise of automation to handle formerly human work.
That’s the trend we need to examine, and I’d argue, reverse.
What We Gain by Stopping the Trend
Reverse the trend if you can. At minimum, stop it. Here's what you gain:
- Real value from AI for leaders. As leaders can move some of their tasks to AI tools, they should be able to free up time for higher value leader activities like coaching and relationship building. How much time are your leaders saving with their AI efforts?
- The chance to build leadership skills. If the job isn’t getting even more complex with more team members to lead, leaders can begin to focus building on their skills not trying to survive the day. How do you encourage your leaders to grow their skills?
- The chance to improve employee engagement. Gallup data reports on the link between employee engagement and performance indicators, including profitability, productivity and improved quality, as well as lower turnover and less absenteeism. Do you think bigger spans of control improve engagement?
- A way to manage both humans and AI effectively. The future for leaders is to lead both humans and AI agents and systems. Expecting people to lead even more people when they will have other things to lead won’t work. How are you preparing your leaders for this future?
Organizational Next Steps
If you want your leaders to deliver better results, you need to stabilize their footing, not continue to make their job harder. Here are steps in that direction.
Clarify your expectations for leaders.
Leaders can’t succeed, regardless of how many direct reports they have, unless they know what success looks like. How clear are the organizational expectations for leaders, and how often are they reinforced?
Clarify their role in AI implementation.
There is plenty that isn’t clear about AI today, including what we are expecting of them as leaders. Do we want them to be AI experts, trainers, implementers, or something else? Do your leaders know what their AI role is?
Stop the reorgs.
Seriously, stop them. Unless you are merging with another enterprise, stop shifting the seats and let your leaders gain their footing and confidence. How successful was your last reorg anyway?
Engage the leaders.
Find out how they are doing. Ask them what is working for them and what they need to build their skills and confidence. When was the last time you asked your leaders what they need to succeed?
Target development individually.
Not every leader has the same development needs. Help them build individual plans and consider their development a top priority. How are you supporting the development of your leaders?
A leader with 12 direct reports faces more people decisions every day and has less time to think each one through. That's why we built Claridus – an AI platform launching this fall that gives leaders decision clarity in the moment, so they can handle the load and keep building their skills. Learn more and see a short demo.
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