# How many reps does a sales manager have now?

About five. Software and IT sales teams had 4.99 reps per manager title in early 2026, up from 4.16 at the end of 2016. The 2023 cuts nudged that up 2.8% rather than resetting it.

By Cristian Frunze, Founder of Ken · Oct 20, 2026 · [Ken Research](/research) No. 11 · Sales teams, Hiring and org design

## Key findings

- **4.99** sales reps per manager-level title at software and IT companies in early 2026, up from 4.16 at the end of 2016. The median team had 4.0.
- **+2.8%** wider spans from the end of 2022 to the end of 2024 (95% interval 1.5% to 4.0%), as manager titles fell 5.3% and reps 1.7%.
- **+2.4 points** more managers left than normal turnover predicts where companies shrank 10% or more. Their usual 2.9-point retention edge over reps disappeared.
- **33.5%** of software and IT sales teams of five or more people had nobody with a manager-level sales title in 2026, up from 27.8% in 2016.

At software and IT companies, a sales manager title now comes with about five sales reps: **4.99 sales individual contributors per manager-level sales title** in the first quarter of 2026, across 9,524 sales teams. The median team had 4.0.

The 2023 cuts nudged that number up rather than reset it. From the end of 2022 to the end of 2024, manager titles in these teams fell 5.3% and reps fell 1.7%, so each manager title covered 2.8% more reps (95% interval 1.5% to 4.0%).

**Figure 1. Software sales spans have widened for a decade**

Sales individual contributors per manager-level sales title, pooled over sales teams of five or more people, at each quarter end. The dashed line is all industries.

| Quarter end | Software and IT | All industries |
| --- | --- | --- |
| 2016 Q1 | 4.08 | 3.24 |
| 2016 Q2 | 4.11 | 3.27 |
| 2016 Q3 | 4.15 | 3.27 |
| 2016 Q4 | 4.16 | 3.30 |
| 2017 Q1 | 4.15 | 3.27 |
| 2017 Q2 | 4.18 | 3.29 |
| 2017 Q3 | 4.23 | 3.30 |
| 2017 Q4 | 4.24 | 3.33 |
| 2018 Q1 | 4.25 | 3.29 |
| 2018 Q2 | 4.30 | 3.32 |
| 2018 Q3 | 4.36 | 3.33 |
| 2018 Q4 | 4.37 | 3.35 |
| 2019 Q1 | 4.37 | 3.31 |
| 2019 Q2 | 4.41 | 3.33 |
| 2019 Q3 | 4.46 | 3.33 |
| 2019 Q4 | 4.46 | 3.36 |
| 2020 Q1 | 4.47 | 3.31 |
| 2020 Q2 | 4.46 | 3.32 |
| 2020 Q3 | 4.45 | 3.34 |
| 2020 Q4 | 4.45 | 3.39 |
| 2021 Q1 | 4.45 | 3.37 |
| 2021 Q2 | 4.50 | 3.41 |
| 2021 Q3 | 4.53 | 3.41 |
| 2021 Q4 | 4.55 | 3.43 |
| 2022 Q1 | 4.55 | 3.40 |
| 2022 Q2 | 4.62 | 3.43 |
| 2022 Q3 | 4.66 | 3.42 |
| 2022 Q4 | 4.65 | 3.43 |
| 2023 Q1 | 4.61 | 3.39 |
| 2023 Q2 | 4.61 | 3.41 |
| 2023 Q3 | 4.63 | 3.40 |
| 2023 Q4 | 4.64 | 3.41 |
| 2024 Q1 | 4.65 | 3.38 |
| 2024 Q2 | 4.68 | 3.40 |
| 2024 Q3 | 4.74 | 3.39 |
| 2024 Q4 | 4.78 | 3.40 |
| 2025 Q1 | 4.82 | 3.38 |
| 2025 Q2 | 4.87 | 3.39 |
| 2025 Q3 | 4.92 | 3.39 |
| 2025 Q4 | 4.95 | 3.40 |
| 2026 Q1 | 4.99 | 3.39 |

*Source: Ken internal data (company and career records Ken uses for sales and outreach), analysed by Cristian Frunze.*

## What we measured

We rebuilt every company's sales team at each quarter end from 2016 to the first quarter of 2026, using the job start and end dates in the work histories in Ken internal data, and read each person's level from their title. Reps are sales individual contributors below manager level: SDRs, account executives, account managers, sales engineers, business development reps and general sales staff. Customer success, RevOps and marketing are not counted.

The sample is sales teams of five or more people at software and IT companies: 14,320 companies and 553,498 people in early 2026, all in six countries: the US, the UK, Canada, Australia, Ireland and New Zealand.

## A slow widening, not a 2023 break

The number has drifted up for a decade. Software and IT sales teams had 4.16 reps per manager title at the end of 2016 and 4.65 at the end of 2022, 11.7% more. It dipped briefly in 2023 and then kept rising, to 4.78 at the end of 2024 and 4.99 in early 2026, as reps came back faster than managers: from the end of 2024, reps grew 6.2% and manager titles 1.0%.

Across all industries the ratio barely moved, from 3.30 at the end of 2016 to 3.39 now. The widening is a software and IT story.

The manager layer is thinning in other ways too. One in three software and IT sales teams of five or more people (33.5%) has nobody with a manager-level sales title, up from 27.8% at the end of 2016. And each sales director title sits over fewer manager titles: 1.20 now, against 1.46 at the end of 2016.

## Where companies shrank, managers lost their edge

We followed everyone in a sales role at the end of 2022 at software and IT companies with at least 50 people, 493,276 people at 7,302 companies, and checked who was still at the same company two years later.

In companies whose headcount fell 10% or more, 48.6% of managers and 49.1% of reps had left. In companies that did not shrink, managers were the stickier group: 24.7% left, against 27.6% of reps. In normal times, then, a manager is 2.9 points less likely to leave than a rep. Where companies shrank, that edge disappeared. The difference between the two gaps, **2.4 points** (95% interval 0.5 to 4.0), is how much more managers left than normal turnover would predict.

**Figure 2. Where companies shrank, managers left as often as reps**

Share of people in a sales role at the end of 2022 who had left their company by the end of 2024, at software and IT companies with at least 50 people, by level and by whether the company's headcount fell 10% or more.

|   | Company shrank 10% or more | Company did not shrink |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Reps | 49.1% | 27.6% |
| Managers | 48.6% | 24.7% |
| Directors | 53.2% | 28.2% |
| VPs and above | 57.4% | 30.1% |

*Source: Ken internal data (company and career records Ken uses for sales and outreach), analysed by Cristian Frunze.*

The most exposed people were more senior still. In shrinking companies, 53.2% of sales directors and 57.4% of sales VPs and above were gone by the end of 2024. In companies that did not shrink, the four groups left at rates between 24.7% and 30.1%.

## What a "manager" title means

These numbers come from job titles, not org charts. The most common manager-level sales title at software and IT companies is business development manager, held by 14.2% of everyone with such a title, and it usually names a seller. Regional and territory sales managers are often individual sellers too.

So we also counted only titles that leave little doubt the person leads people, such as sales manager, sales team lead or sales development manager. Only 39.6% of the manager titles in these sales teams pass that test. Counting only them, the pooled span is 11.54 reps per manager and the median team has 7.2, and the widening from 2022 to 2024 is a little larger, 4.1%. The real span probably lies between the two definitions. The direction of change is the same in both.

## Spans grow with size, then narrow at the top

The median sales team has 3.0 reps per manager title at companies with up to 50 people, 5.0 at 51 to 200, 6.0 at 201 to 1,000 and 6.3 at 1,001 to 5,000, but 4.9 at 5,001 or more, where titles such as regional sales manager are common. Between the end of 2022 and the end of 2024, spans widened at every size, by 2.6% to 4.9% within the same companies.

**Figure 3. Spans are widest at companies of 1,001 to 5,000 people**

Median sales reps per manager title among software and IT sales teams in 2026 Q1, by the company's headcount in Ken internal data. The strict definition counts only titles that clearly name a people manager.

|   | All manager titles | Clear manager titles only |
| --- | --- | --- |
| 1-50 | 3.0 | 4.0 |
| 51-200 | 5.0 | 8.0 |
| 201-1,000 | 6.0 | 12.0 |
| 1,001-5,000 | 6.3 | 14.3 |
| 5,001+ | 4.9 | 13.5 |

*Source: Ken internal data (company and career records Ken uses for sales and outreach), analysed by Cristian Frunze.*

For a benchmark: half of all software and IT sales teams with a manager title have between 2.0 and 7.2 reps per manager title. With clear manager titles only, half sit between 4.0 and 13.0.

## What we expected

We wrote down five predictions before pulling any data. Two held: spans by title are narrow (a median of 4.0, inside the 2 to 5 we expected), and managers left more than normal turnover predicts where companies shrank, but not more than reps. Three did not. We expected spans to narrow through the growth years; they widened 11.7%. We expected the cuts to widen them by at least 5%; they widened 2.8%. And we expected the widest spans at the largest companies and the most widening in the middle; spans peak at 1,001 to 5,000 people and widened most at the smallest companies.

## What it means for sales leaders

- **Four or five reps per manager title is normal on paper.** If your team has a dozen reps per first-line manager, you are at the wide end. Before you compare, count only the managers who actually manage.
- **The great flattening was real but small in sales.** Manager titles fell more than reps in 2023 and 2024, but the change was a few percent, not a redesign, and it continued a trend that started years earlier.
- **When a company shrinks, managers are as exposed as reps.** The usual retention edge of a manager disappeared in the companies that cut, and directors and VPs left at even higher rates.

## What this data cannot show

- **Titles, not org charts.** A manager title does not prove anyone reports to that person, hence the strict definition.
- **Edited titles.** Some people promoted inside a company edit their old title instead of adding a new one, which makes the past look more managerial than it was. The 2022 to 2024 widening holds unless about half of all such promotions were recorded that way.
- **Six countries, late updates.** Staff elsewhere are missing, and people add new jobs months late, so the series stops in early 2026.
- **Leaving is not only layoffs.** "Left the company" includes resignations. The comparison with companies that did not shrink nets out normal turnover, not every difference between them.
- **Association, not cause.** These are comparisons over time and between companies, not proof that the cuts caused the changes.

## Data and method

- **Data:** Ken internal data: the public work histories and company records Ken uses for sales and outreach, reused by Cristian Frunze for this study. Six countries: the US, the UK, Canada, Australia, Ireland and New Zealand.
- **Sample:** Sales teams of five or more people at software and IT companies: 14,320 companies and 553,498 people in 2026 Q1, 9,524 with a manager title. Leavers: 493,276 people at 7,302 companies.
- **Date range:** Quarter ends from 2016 Q1 to 2026 Q1. Leavers followed from the end of 2022 to the end of 2024.
- **Method:** Pre-registered. Teams rebuilt at each quarter end from role start and end dates; reps per manager title pooled and by company, a difference in differences of exit rates, and company bootstrap 95% intervals. Headline numbers recomputed by a separate analysis.
- **Excluded:** Customer success, RevOps and marketing roles, which are not counted in the sales team; Sales teams with fewer than five people; Companies with fewer than 50 people, in the leavers comparison; Quarters after March 2026, which are still filling in.
- **Privacy:** Aggregates only. Any group smaller than 50 people is suppressed, and no individual is named.

[Full methodology as Markdown](/research/sales-manager-span-of-control/methodology.md) · [Download the full methodology (PDF)](/research/sales-manager-span-of-control.pdf)

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