Avoiding hierarchy as you scale — 10 things that actually work:
1/ Don't have an office. Sit with the employees.
2/ Sit in customer support and take calls every couple of weeks. Multiple benefits!
3/ Publicly praise people who disagree with you on Slack or the wiki.
4/ Push for 15:1ish reporting ratios. Flat orgs move faster.
5/ Host quarterly dinners at your house with 8 people who don't report to you. Multiple benefits!!
6/ If you fly private, shut up about it.
7/ Bring non-direct-reports to offsites.
8/ Get good at assigning DRIs who can drive projects across org boundaries. Single owner, no committee. …If you ask a committee to look after your plants while youre away, you’ll come back to dead plants.
9/ Take hard questions at all-hands and don't spin. If you need to think on a tricky one, say so — then actually follow up on slavk, wiki, wherever.
10/ Publish your priorities publicly. Transparency kills hierarchy faster than any org redesign.
Bonus/ Jensen is mostky right. Dirrct report 1:1’s should only last a short while. Criticizing (with care) and praising in public irks, but works.