Price’s Law
Summary
Section titled “Summary”Half of the work in any domain is done by the square root of the total number of contributors.
Still Applicable?
Section titled “Still Applicable?”Yes. Especially visible in open-source, R&D, and high-performing teams.
Additional Detail
Section titled “Additional Detail”Price’s Law, named after Derek J. de Solla Price, highlights an imbalance in creative and intellectual output. If a project has 100 contributors, roughly 10 of them will produce 50% of the total output. This is not a moral judgment — it’s a statistical pattern observed in academia, publishing, and collaborative work.
For engineering managers, Price’s Law reinforces the importance of identifying and supporting your highest-leverage contributors. But it’s also a warning: an overreliance on a small group creates risk and bottlenecks. Leaders should aim to scale excellence through mentorship, documentation, and knowledge sharing — not just rely on a few heroes.
The law also applies to bug fixes, architecture decisions, and innovation. Many successful engineering cultures focus on increasing the surface area of contribution so that more people can become part of that square root cohort.
Origin
Section titled “Origin”Derek J. de Solla Price, 1963, in the context of scientific productivity.