One of the primary reasons for layers of management in an organization is coordination and alignment (C&A) across the business. When systems and processes for C&A are lacking, the work of C&A must be handled manually, which requires more layers of management. Sometimes this happens because leadership has not put the right systems in place, and sometimes because the nature of the business does not lend itself to such systems. Additionally, the people who could implement these systems might resist doing so, since the systems could eliminate their own jobs.
Along the same lines, consider why a company might want to transition from a person to a machine doing a job. One of the key benefits is that a machine can be set to run with minimal oversight, which addresses C&A automatically. This eliminates variability, allowing the company to reduce management layers as well. The same applies to using software instead of people—you can “set it and forget it,” with no conflicting human motivations or interests to manage.
Now consider AI tools being applied in the workplace. They enable the creation of systems that operate on a “set it and forget it” model. As a result, many layers of management could disappear, since far less C&A effort would be required.