SPAN OF CONTROL

"The optimal span of control for managers is the extent to which they can assess and manage the individual effectiveness of employees" - Elliott Jaques

Span of control refers to the number of employees who report directly to the manager. In the first half of the last century, the maximum number of employees directly subordinated to the manager was 6 people, or even less. But since the 1980s, with the development of industry and information technology, organizational leaders have flattened their organizational structure, and the upper limit of this range has been increased to 10 or more people. The main reason for this was the development of information technologies and the availability of these technologies. Information technologies have gradually replaced middle management functions such as collecting, processing, and presenting operational data, and organizations have been able to reduce the number of middle managers and employ more employees with fewer managers. It is no coincidence that in 1986 statistics, 55% of Fortune 500 companies had a COO (chief operating officer) position, which oversees the company's main business processes and includes the main powers in this area, while in the corresponding statistics of 2014, this ratio was decreased to %36.

Another reason for the expansion of the span of control is that organizations are implementing more and more effective follow-up training programs. Thus, in the traditional management approach, the path to the position of CEO (General Director) passed through the positions of Deputy CEO (Deputy Director, Vice President, etc.) or COO. In this case, those duties led to narrowing the range of the head of the organization and increasing the chain of command. Continuing education programs have enabled the promotion of positions from various functional areas to the position of CEO, and thus the need for the positions of Deputy CEO and COO in career matters has gradually disappeared.

The expansion of the range of control has not left an impact on the composition of the management board of the organizations. Thus, the mentioned trend led to the involvement of some functional managers in the management team and the expansion of the composition of the team. For information, it can be noted that since the eighties of the last century, 4-5 new functional management positions such as CMO (marketing director), CIO (IT director), CHRO (HR director) have been involved in the board.

Graicunas, one of the first theorists on the optimal number of spans of control, hypothesized in 1933 about the influence of mental capacity and attention on spans of control. He proved mathematically that each employee included in the span of control increases the potential for interaction with the supervisor and the workload of the supervisor. According to Graicunas, the cost and speed of management with a rigid chain of command creates a dilemma, and organizations must think of different mechanisms to overcome this problem.

In 1956, Lyndall Urwick further theorized the effect of geographic spread and face-to-face encounters on span of control.

McKenzie also stated in 1978 that: “some think that a wide span of control will lead to a reduction in management costs. but on the other hand, if the span of control is wide, the manager will not be able to effectively manage a large number of employees who directly report to him. Therefore, organizations must be able to properly balance the above-mentioned opposing trends."

Fayol, who interpreted the management of the organization from the management perspective for the first time, also noted that the span of control is directly proportional to the burden of information on the managers. He recommended that the subordinate employees communicate with each other directly, not through their superiors. This principle is called "Fayol bridge" in management science. According to the Fayol bridge, decision-making authority should be shared with people or structures at the lower level of the organization, and the authority and responsibility of the lower ones should be increased. This theory is one of the first steps taken in the field of horizontal integration of organizational activities.

Fayol suggested that the optimal number of employees should be less than 6, and that there may be up to 20-30 people in positions such as foreman, foreman, and supervisor.

In 1951, Davis further concretized the ideas about the optimal span of control and divided management work into 2 parts: physical and mental work. For high-level and intellectual leaders, an adequate range was determined to be 3-8 people. It was reported that the first-level line managers who manage the workforce can manage 30 people.

Theorists such as Mckenzie, Massie, and Pugh note that there cannot be a generally accepted optimal range. According to them, there are many factors that influence the balance between the controllability of an organization and the desired level of control.

The span of control is highly dependent on factors such as organizational structure, technology used, functions and tasks performed, competence of managers and employees, and geographical distribution. Elliott Jaques in 1988 brought an alternative approach to this issue, stating that the optimal span of control for managers is the extent to which they can assess and manage the individual effectiveness of employees.

In 2012, Gary Nielsen, in an article published in HBR magazine, noted that the seniority of the CEO directly affects the span of control. Thus, a newly appointed manager prefers to work directly with all subordinate managers at the beginning and during the learning period. As managers gain experience, they tend to delegate and narrow their spans of control. In addition, factors such as the CEO's participation in internal committees and commissions, performing work and responsibilities other than his direct main functions, also directly affect the scope of control.

In general, there is no standard figure for the control range. It is not a right step to create and apply a norm for the organization based on the information provided in various theories or benchmark reports. If such a norm is to be created, the strategy, corporate culture, management style, leadership training programs of that organization should be taken into account.