I recently read an article by Bob Sutton in the UK edition of WIRED which picked up Jeff Bezos’ infamous “Two Pizza Rule” and provided (further) scientific evidence for the rule.
The “Two Pizza Rule” is simple: If a team can’t be fed with two pizzas, it is too big. The reasoning behind the rule is that with each additional member to a team you increase the communication overhead, foster groupthink and create numerous other effects which ultimately lead to mediocrity. It’s essentially the same message as Frederick Brooks spelled out in his groundbreaking 1975 book “The Mythical Man-Month”.
Reading this made me think about how effective and agile a company such as WhatsApp (with its 55 employees) can be in comparison to someone like Skype (with it’s roughly 2,000 employees).
Stay nimble!