I just finished Yuval Noah Harari's Sapiens and found an interesting connection:
"Sociological research has shown that the largest natural size of a group organized by gossip is approx. 150 people. Most people can't get to know more than this amount of person in depth, so they can't gossip about them effectively either. To this day, the critical size of human organizations hovers around that magic number."
While the plant had around 150 employees, I knew all my colleagues, I knew basic information about them so that I could talk to them in a few minutes, I knew what kind of work they do, what their attitude is, how much they can be improved. I was able to chat with them at least once every two weeks and connect personally.
However, when we switched to continuous shifts and the number of employees exceeded 200 people, somehow this changed, I lost the possibility of regular personal contact, I didn't know everyone, the daily operation became completely different. Until then, there were processes and systems, but they became much more important because the other supporting pillar, which according to them was based on the rumor, was less present.
This can be a good point of reference for organically developing businesses, because if we accept that even in the case of ancient hordes and companies above 150 people, it is no longer possible to know everything and everyone, we can consciously prepare processes and systems by the time we reach this size.
And at the same time, prepare to build a management team that represents the same values, work ethic, and expectations as the number one manager, is able to fully see his own area of less than 150 people, and can independently make decisions in that area.
The lack of these support systems can hinder the growth of the organization. If they are not built in time, but the organization still grows, operations can become chaotic, decision-making lengthy, and internal cooperation can become a problem.
So let’s think : what holds us together? Are we organized enough to cross the magic line?
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