Hierarchy in Teams: Why It Often Does More Harm Than Good
We've all experienced it - working in a team with a domineering boss or competing for a position in a harsh corporate hierarchy. Frustrating to say the least. But does hierarchy actually help teams perform better? Or is that a wrongful assumption underlying the management structures of 99.9% of companies? Let's look at the research.
I recently came across an interesting meta-analysis by Greer and colleagues. The paper examines decades of research on hierarchy in teams.
Their findings send a clear message to organizations holding onto traditional top-down structures:
When it comes to team effectiveness, hierarchy is likely doing more harm than good.
Let's unpack.
The functional myth
Even today, management experts and nearly all organizations seem to believe the idea that clear hierarchies are crucial for team coordination and performance.
The logic seems reasonable at first glance - having a chain of command should make decision-making smoother, clarify roles, and help teams work more efficiently.
But this positive view of hierarchy turns out to be more hopeful thinking than reality.
When Greer and colleagues analyzed data from over 13,000 teams across 54 studies, they found that hierarchy had a small but significant negative effect on team performance.
Even worse, the researchers found no evidence that hierarchy improves team coordination processes. The data showed hierarchy was actually linked to worse coordination in teams.
That's not good news for all those hierarchical companies out there.
Conflict: The true result of hierarchy
If hierarchy isn't improving coordination, what is it doing? Creating conflict, it seems.
The meta-analysis revealed that hierarchical differences consistently increased conflict-enabling states in teams.
This matches what many of us have seen firsthand - status differences create resentment, power struggles emerge, and teamwork suffers. The more vertically structured the team, the more likely these harmful dynamics are to appear.
So while hierarchy may make some managers feel powerful and in control, the data suggests it's actively undermining team unity and effectiveness. That's not a recipe for high performance.
When hierarchy hurts the most
Of course, context matters. The researchers identified several factors that make the negative effects of hierarchy worse:
- Membership instability - When team composition changes often, hierarchy creates more problems. Rigid power structures don't work well with dynamic teams.
- Skill differentiation - The more specialized team members' skills are, the more hierarchy hurts.
- Hierarchy mutability - When ranks can change easily, conflict increases as members compete for positions.
- Task interdependence - Contrary to popular belief, hierarchy is especially harmful when team members need to work closely together. So much for "clear chains of command."
The lesson? If your team has high turnover, specialized roles, shifting power dynamics, or highly collaborative work - you should be particularly cautious about hierarchical structures.
And remember, in today's world of work, that's the reality for most teams.
Hierarchy isn't all bad, it seems
The news isn't all bad for hierarchy supporters. The researchers did find one situation where more structured teams performed better - when faced with highly unclear tasks.
This suggests hierarchy may have some benefits in chaotic, uncertain environments by providing needed structure.
Rethinking hierarchy
So where do we go from here? While more research is needed (as always), this meta-analysis clearly shows we need to rethink our basic assumptions about organizing teams.
Flatter, more equal structures like the ones we are researching at Corporate Rebels, are likely to produce better outcomes in most situations.
And even when some vertical structure is needed, we should be thoughtful about how to implement it in ways that minimize conflict and power struggles.
Some possibilities to explore that we often see in more progressive organizations:
- Rotating leadership roles
- Decentralized decision-making
- Influence based on expertise rather than formal rank
- Focusing on collective goals over individual status
The key is creating team structures that enable coordination and use diverse skills without triggering the horrors of hierarchy.
Just because hierarchy is common doesn't mean it's best. By letting go of top-down control and fostering more collaborative team cultures, we may find our organizations are capable of far more than we thought.
We see the proof in the 800+ self-managing companies we research.
The choice is clear: stick to outdated ideas of command-and-control, or embrace new approaches that unlock teams' full potential.
What will you choose?
If you want to truly understand how to avoid the downsides of hierarchy, I recommend to join our upcoming Masterclass 'Running and Scaling Self-Managing Organizations' (starting on September 24) Here’s more info.
