No More Job Titles. Now What Happens to Ambition?
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Book Matt to Speak →Take away the job titles and the questions about power do not disappear. On CNBC, Matt Britton joins a discussion of Zappos’ move to holacracy and what a flatter organization means for the people inside it.
He considers the change against the backdrop of the company’s sale to Amazon. Employees who did not receive the same financial rewards from that transaction were being asked to navigate a structure without familiar management titles or career ladders.
Matt argues that titles can be useful outside a company as well as inside it. Recruiters use them, alongside scope and responsibility, to assess a person’s experience. Removing them can make professional progress harder to communicate.
Motivation is another concern. Promotions provide a visible signal of growth. Peer-based rewards and lateral influence may offer alternatives, but Matt questions how they affect incentives, conformity and accountability.
He also acknowledges the cost of excessive bureaucracy, particularly managers whose main function is managing other managers. The discussion asks how much structure helps people work clearly and how much gets in their way.
An organization can erase boxes from its chart while informal hierarchies remain. Matt’s focus is the human side of the design: employees need to understand how decisions are made, how contribution is recognized and where a career can go.
