Why?
- It allows people to focus either on management or on object-level work: I think it's often better for people to manage either 0 or >4 people:
- If you manage 1-2 people then you're awkwardly split between your individual contributor work and management. This can be hard to combine, because management is often quite bit-y and also requires time to think about strategy, so balancing bit-y management, strategy, and IC work is often a bit too much.
- Note: this doesn’t mean that managers should never do object level work. It’s good for managers to do such work, both to stay in touch with what’s going on and what great work looks like, and to scope out new areas in order to hire someone to lead them. So I’m pro managers doing some object level work, but their focus should remain on managing others to do that, and the object-level work is in service of their management work.
- Easier communication: Additionally, flatter heirarchies often make communication and coordination easier.