New Delhi: OnlyFans may be a global content giant today but behind its massive revenues is a surprisingly small team. The popular content platform operates with just 42 employees, yet pulls in billions of dollars in revenue. According to a Business Insider report, CEO Keily Blair says the company’s biggest strength is its ultra-lean structure with no middle management.
Lean Team, Massive Productivity Gains
Speaking on the Masters of Scale podcast, Blair said the company’s workforce is “pretty efficient,” explaining that removing the “squidgy layer” of middle management has helped boost productivity and speed up decision-making.
Revenue Per Employee: How OnlyFans Compares (in Indian Rupees)
OnlyFans: About $37.6 million per employee (around Rs 312 crore)
Nvidia: $3.6 million (around Rs 30 crore)
Apple: $2.4 million (around Rs 20 crore)
Meta: $2.2 million (around Rs 18 crore)
Google: $1.9 million (around Rs 16 crore)
Microsoft/OpenAI: $1.1 million (around Rs 9 crore)
Why OnlyFans Skips Middle Management
Explaining the strategy, Blair said the company hires people at two clear levels. On one end, it brings in highly experienced senior professionals, and on the other, driven and ambitious junior talent. According to her, the focus is on attitude and aptitude, not just years of experience.
As for middle management, Blair said OnlyFans deliberately avoids that layer. She explained that the company doesn’t believe in having a “squidgy layer” in between, adding that in her experience, people rarely benefit from having a traditional middle manager.
No Big Teams, Just Big Impact
Blair also said she doesn’t believe that leaders in large companies need to manage big teams to succeed. Speaking on the podcast, she explained that even a single employee can deliver outstanding results and be highly valued. According to her, there is no “manager track” at the company, only individual contributors who are judged by their impact.
Interestingly, this thinking mirrors a broader trend in the tech industry. Since the wave of layoffs that began in late 2023, many companies have trimmed their middle management layers. Major firms like Amazon, Google, Intel, Meta and Microsoft have cut a significant number of such roles to simplify decision-making and reduce hierarchy.
A Radical Workplace Model That Challenges Big Tech
OnlyFans has taken the idea of a lean organisation to the extreme by removing middle management entirely. With a small team and a business model where most of the revenue goes straight to creators, the company’s revenue per employee remains exceptionally high.
While some critics say this approach may work better for a niche platform than for large tech giants, Blair believes it proves a simple point—top performers don’t need constant supervision to succeed. At a time when companies across the world are cutting jobs to improve efficiency, OnlyFans presents a bold alternative: keep the organisation flat, hire the right people, and trust individuals to deliver results at scale.
Disclaimer : This story is auto aggregated by a computer programme and has not been created or edited by DOWNTHENEWS. Publisher: ZEE News
