Metcalfe’s Law - How to Improve Communication in Growing Teams

Understanding how many people you have on your team is essential for effective communication. As the image shows, with each new person, the communication lines increase rapidly—this is where Metcalfe’s Law comes into play, explaining how the complexity of communication networks grows exponentially with each added member.

Overcoming Communication Challenges

Delegate and Sub-team

As the team expands, the challenge isn’t just more communication lines—it’s surviving the “I thought Bob told you” syndrome. To tackle this, delegate communication responsibilities. Break your team into smaller, manageable units with clear leaders responsible for relaying essential updates.

Example: You’re running a 20-person team. Rather than addressing everyone directly all the time (and hoping for the best), create four smaller teams, each led by a team leader. The captain ensures that communication flows smoothly between leadership and the rest of the group. It’s like having assistant managers, except these won’t pass the buck to Janet in accounting.

Establish Communication Protocols

If there are no clear communication paths, more people equal more confusion. With a larger team, you need clear communication protocols to ensure everyone receives the same message.

Example: To keep everyone in the loop, use tools like Slack or Microsoft Teams to centralise information. If something’s important, repeat it in multiple channels. Just be sure you don’t fall into “Inbox-ception”—when you send so many messages that your team spends all day reading them instead of doing actual work.

Open Feedback Channels

Larger teams tend to make individuals feel unheard. But there’s nothing like the anonymous suggestion box to make you feel like someone’s paying attention. Encourage open channels for feedback.

Example: You’ve grown your team to 50 people. Instead of handling feedback like a whisper game gone wrong, set up Q&A sessions or anonymous feedback forms. That way, you’re not hearing, “I heard from John that Sarah is upset because no one listened to Bob in the last meeting.” You’re hearing it straight from the source—or a “totally anonymous” source.

Intentional Communication

When teams grow, your communication needs to be deliberate. Overloading the team with too much information can be just as bad as not sharing enough.

Example: Let’s say you’ve got a new policy on using the breakroom coffee machine. You could announce it once via email and hope for the best—or you can throw it into a team meeting, follow up with a Slack post, and casually drop a mention when you see someone pouring a cup. It’s the “annoy them until they comply” strategy—it works every time.

Why Bother?

The more people you have, the more lines of communication there are, and the more likely someone will hear something completely different from what was intended.

By delegating, structuring communication channels, encouraging feedback, and being intentional with your messages, you’ll steer your team through the chaos—and maybe even a laugh.