[finance-geek]

How sure how closely it compares to large companies, but with most of the [large] companies i've been at, the metric for promotion was how many people you could hire under you. Not code quality, size of system, not impact, not money saved, not business enabled....just the size of your org chart. Not sure why HR devolves into such a silly metric for non-revenue generating departments, but i've seen it at 5 separate organizations. Is it any wonder employees then behave in the ways they do and build empires?

[mattbrewsbytes]

If you read Parkinsons Law you will discover the Law Of Multiplication of Subordinates. This is the little known law compared to the one about work filling the time, etc.

He shows that between 1914 and 1928 the number of ships in the Royal Navy went down 67% but the number of Admiralty officials (aka management) went up 78%.

He was the Scott Adams of that time. (Google the article which originally appeared in The Economist in November 1955)

[arethuza]

The Royal Navy famously now has far more admirals than it does ships. Something like 40 admirals and 260 captains for just 19 ships...