If they are shifting employee led initiatives like employees are responsible for development efforts and writing their own individual goals. What's the point of top heavy management? We dont need them! They cause more risk to the company by being sloppy.
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US Bank still has a problem of too many layers because even though they theoretically have a goal to reduce that they only wanted to do the changes one organization at a time and so it is taking forever since there are so many organizations.
Another problem to be mindful of that seems to be more and more pervasive in the banking industry is that with the large banks of today, compared to prior decades, many of them necessarily have more middle management layers, and so often people are hired to management who have never done the job or barely have done the job of the individual contributor so they are far less effective as managers and mentors, but it gets worse because regional and smaller banks are more likely to hire them because they are coming from a big bank brand name, but yet ultimately are far weaker.
@a8 We are nowhere near 10. All the managers on my floor have 5 or 6.
@a8 perhaps some of us actually are or were managers? And it doesnt take a manager or a genius to realize here that its OVERKILL! We need a manager to manage a manager and they have a manager. And we all know that its built inefficiencies.
@a1 we are almost there! We have risk and compliance managers without experience and knowledge in either area. We shall see how that turns out.
Valuable insight is not limited to those in management roles. Research shows that organizations perform best when they have thoughtfully designed structures and when feedback from employees at all levels is taken seriously. Leaders can choose to trust that employees are doing their jobs and to review survey feedback with the intent to implement meaningful improvements. Unfortunately, this organization has chosen not to do so. We’ve seen how what’s done with our TTUS feedback (nothing) and we’ve heard the tone of our own CEO. Their choices send a clear message about how little employee input is valued.
Additionally, the organization appears to prioritize the work-life balance of overseas contractors over that of its own employees and often over customer experience as well. With effective leadership, a single manager could reasonably support 25–30 team members rather than the current 5–10, creating a more efficient structure. The company would also benefit from promoting proven internal leaders instead of hiring external grifters whose primary motivation appears to be financial gain rather than long-term organizational health.
@a8 Nicely put! Moderation is key. Anything in excess (executive management, middle management or individual contributor) is the problem.
It cracks me up when I read comments like this by people who have never been managers. What do you think organization design should look like? Should we have all 70,000 report straight to the ceo? Or maybe have one middle layer, where you have 7,000 people reporting to a manager?
Can we at least try to have some thoughtful discussion here? Like for example why the ideal number of direct reports is 7 to 10. And if you do the math with 70,000 employees, you're going to have several layers in the military
A significant portion of the operational turbulence appears to stem from middle-management–driven initiative churn, where projects are frequently initiated, re-scoped, and reframed primarily to demonstrate activity rather than to deliver measurable outcomes.
So so so many layers of middle management. I’m waiting until we get to one to one manager to worker bee.