How Do You Calculate the Ideal Number of Employees a Manager Can Handle?

Can anybody help me in clarifying whether there is any calculation to determine how many people can be managed by a single person, i.e., how many people can work under a manager/supervisor, etc.? Kindly provide me with the calculation. Thanks in advance.

Hi Mary,

As far as my knowledge is concerned, it is not defined that exactly how many employees have to work under a manager; however, it purely depends upon the company. That depends upon the industry and the type of work they do. If you consider a manager, they cannot take care of all the activities within the organization by themselves, so they definitely need help from their subordinates. In a software company like ours, we have different types of managers to oversee different departments.

If you want to know exactly how many employees one manager can take care of, I can't tell you as that depends upon the manager's ability to handle things. I didn't understand exactly from which perspective you are thinking. Please provide us with more details on this, and then we can try to help you.

Regards,
Kalyan. 😃

Dear Friends,

What you are asking is known as Span of Control in Management. There is no hard and fast rule regarding the no. of subordinates supervised or managed by a supervisor or manager. It depends on the ability of the manager , ability of the subordinate, efficiency of the system- reporting, communication, quantum of work etc.

An attempt to suggest the maximum no . of subordinates can be managed by a manager was made by Management Guru- Graicunas. It was made on the basis of no. of relationships occurs during the reporting

Graicunas himself suggested that the maximum number of subordinates should be five and probably four in most cases. These figures were tempered with considerations of the scope and scale of the work involved and for which the subordinate was responsible. For example, a group of six factory workers reporting to a supervisor presents a less complex problem than six division presidents reporting to the CEO of a large company. And six presidents of completely independent divisions presents a simpler problem than six vice presidents of closely integrated divisions. Regardless of these considerations, the number of relationships a superior must attend to rises exponentially after the fourth subordinate. Thus Graicunas cautioned any executive seeking to add a fifth directly reporting subordinate to consider the fact that this would add 20 new relationships for himself and nine for each of his current colleagues. The total number of relationships would increase by 56, going from 44 to 100. As Graicunas noted, this was "an increase in complexity of 127 per cent in return for a 20 per cent increase in working capacity.

Kind of Relationship Variable Formula

Direct single relationships a= n

Cross relationships b =n (n – 1)

Direct group relationships c =n (2n/2 – 1)

Total direct single and cross relationships (a + b) d= n2

Total direct single and group (a + c) e =n (2n/2)

Total direct and cross relationships (a + b + c) f =n (2n/2 + n – 1)



n = number of persons supervised

a = number of direct single relationships (superior to subordinate)

b = number of cross relationships (subordinate to subordinate - in both directions)

c = number of direct group relationships (superior to combinations of subordinates)

d = total group relationships (a + b)

e = total of direct relationships (a + c)

f = total of direct and group relationships (a + b + c)

regards

Manoj Pillai