Manager workloads are stretching beyond sustainable limits. New Gallup research shows average spans of control climbing while manager engagement falls, a combination that threatens productivity, retention, and decision quality across organizations.
The data that got my attention
Gallup’s 2026 State of the Global Workplace report ties the second straight year of falling employee engagement to a structural problem most organizations ignore: managers now oversee too many people with too little support. The average span of control reached 12.1 direct reports in 2025, up from 10.9 in 2024 and just 8.2 in 2013. That is a 48 percent increase in average team size over 12 years.
At the same time, manager engagement collapsed from 31 percent in 2022 to 22 percent in 2025. The largest single-year drop came between 2024 and 2025, when manager engagement fell five points from 27 percent to 22 percent. The people responsible for team stability are themselves running out of capacity.
Why this matters now
Most leadership teams treat span of control as a cost lever. Flatten the org, widen the reporting lines, and reduce management overhead. The math works on a spreadsheet until the manager layer loses the time to coach, give feedback, and resolve conflicts.
The Gallup data show that managers account for about 70 percent of the variance in team engagement. When a manager’s capacity drops, the effect multiplies across every direct report. One burned-out manager does not stay isolated. It shows up as skipped one-on-ones, delayed feedback, slower decisions, and higher turnover in the team below.
This is happening while organizations still expect managers to lead AI adoption, return-to-office transitions, and continuous change. The manager role has widened in every direction at once.
What the research actually shows
The numbers tell a clear story about how the manager role has changed.
| Metric | 2013 | 2019 | 2022 | 2024 | 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Average span of control | 8.2 | 9.1 | 10.5 | 10.9 | 12.1 |
| Global manager engagement | — | — | 31% | 27% | 22% |
| Share of managers with 25+ reports | — | — | — | 11% | 13% |
| Managers doing IC work outside leadership | — | — | — | 97% | 97% |
The median team size is still only about six, which means a minority of very large teams is pulling the average higher. Roughly two-thirds of managers lead fewer than 10 people, while 13 percent manage 25 or more. But those oversized teams create the bottlenecks that shape culture, retention, and execution across the whole organization.
Separate research confirms the pattern. Gallup finds that employees who receive meaningful feedback in a given week are far more likely to be fully engaged, yet only a small share of employees report that their last manager conversation was meaningful. The wider the span, the harder it becomes to sustain those conversations.
The cost is measurable. Gallup estimates that low engagement costs the world economy about 0 trillion in lost productivity, roughly 9 percent of global GDP. Managers are not the only cause of that loss, but they are the largest controllable factor.
A practical framework for leaders
Fixing this requires changing the manager job, not just cheering for resilience. Leaders should take three concrete steps.
- Audit actual workloads. Track how managers spend their time. If individual-contributor work still consumes a large share, the leadership work gets pushed to evenings and weekends, which is where burnout starts.
- Cap spans of control deliberately. Most managers can lead eight to 10 people well. Past 12, they need either lighter personal production targets or fewer direct reports. Do not let span grow by default after every restructuring.
- Protect the conversations that matter. Coaching, feedback, and career conversations are the first things to vanish when time gets tight. Build them into operating rhythms and measure whether they happen.
Start with a pilot. Pick the teams with the widest spans and highest manager strain. Measure team engagement, retention, and manager hours before and after adjusting the structure. Use that proof to guide wider change.
The bottom line
Span of control is not just an HR design question. It is a capacity question that determines whether managers can do the work they were hired to do. Organizations that keep widening spans without adding support are not saving money. They are borrowing against engagement and paying it back in turnover, slower execution, and lost productivity.
Where to go from here
Leadership teams need a clear picture of where manager capacity is breaking before burnout shows up in the turnover numbers. Start with an assessment that maps spans of control, manager workload, and the people skills your managers need most. Use the results to build a targeted plan for the leaders carrying the heaviest load. executive coaching →
