Energising Middle Management
I have always thought of middle management as the engine room, the crucial conduit interpreting direction from the Executive and translating it to their teams operationally. High value middle managers have the knack of converting organisational speak to a universal language, motivating and supporting their teams to deliver on priority projects, respond to urgent unexpected requests or crises and importantly keeping business as usual on the straight and narrow. And, by the way, when I use the term middle managers, I am referring to the layer immediately below the Executive.
Effective middle managers continually scan upward and downward. Taking direction, reading signals, watching out for their direct report’s performance and wellbeing, scanning the external environment for risks or opportunities in the markets the organisation is pursuing. This skill, sometimes referred to as ‘connecting leadership’, requires these managers to regularly empathise with the burden of both sides, distribute the weight of shared issues, all the time being the buffer – absorbing, digesting and interpreting information.
So let’s stop for a minute and think about the sensation of continuously scanning upward and downward, being constantly on the lookout for potential risks and opportunities, being translator, confidante, motivator and ‘fixer’. My neck feels tired just imagining the upward and downward motion. Problem is it is more than your neck, it is mentally, emotionally and at times physically exhausting.
Coupled with this is that it we appear headed into some gloomier economic weather patterns and it feels as though we are only just coming out of the pandemic super-storm. Understandably, such economic headwinds prompt organisations and businesses to ‘breath in’, press harder on existing human resources, possibly deciding to shed some of their valuable human capital whilst navigating economic uncertainty.
It is exactly these parts of the economic cycle where your middle management needs to know they are valued, not under threat. As history has shown, we will come through the economic bad weather. Shedding valuable intellectual property in your middle management is not, in my view, forward thinking. Middle management, as the engine room, are the ones that as the bad weather lightens, will shift gears for the organisation to make the most of more favourable conditions.
Staying with my engine / car analogy, putting your car in for a service, replacing the oil, tyres and so on is something many of us do because it makes sense from a safety, longevity and value perspective. The same goes for middle management, they too benefit from timely regular tuning.
This does not need to be an overly expensive exercise. There are simple, highly effective measures that go a long way to making sure middle management team members feel appreciated and in turn refreshed in their determination to advance organisational goals and objectives. Let’s step through some of those measures:
Bring Inside the Tent
If the economic headwinds are triggering changes in market approach or areas of focus this needs to be shared with middle management. Bringing middle management inside the tent engenders trust, it will likely generate viable alternatives and provide access to valuable intelligence from outside the organisation given their day to day connections. A good bi-product of this alignment process is that, if done well, it will contribute to a healthy practice of managers feeling free to speak up, where no idea is a bad idea engenders creativity and innovation. Being closer to matters operationally, a middle manager is often best placed to identify systemic problems, opportunities for process improvement and see solutions.
Saying and Meaning Thank You!
Publicly and privately acknowledging the day to day efforts of high performing middle managers goes a long way to lifting morale. The acknowledgement does not need to be for something extraordinary. In my experience noticing smaller more nuanced efforts and impacts can be more powerful for the manager and the team they are responsible for. The subtitles running across the screen in calling out these smaller and more nuanced efforts are, "I see the impact you have, the contribution you are making to advance our organisation, you are valued".
Providing a Psychological Safe Space to Share
Ensuring and reassuring your middle managers that they can come to you to share concerns, blow off steam and work through problems they may be wrestling with is so crucial. Middle managers buffer so much as we discussed before, it is only natural that there is a limit to the buffering and a safe and confidential release can help reset and recharge batteries. Showing empathy and your own experiences in similar circumstances goes a long way.
Encourage Best Practice Sharing
Establishing a forum where middle managers across the organisation can come together, learn from eachother and create a supportive community is a powerful practice. Stepping out for an hour or two once or twice a month can allow a middle manager to move away from their day to day, gain new perspectives and come back into their responsibility area with a different energy.
Use Reward Levers like Coaching:
Retaining high value performing middle managers is a constant theme but even more important as the economic belt tightens. Often coaching budgets are reserved for the Executive, however, there is great value in providing high performing middle managers access to a coach, so they can step out of their ‘work zone’ and consider things more objectively, work through their limiting beliefs, build their confidence, and fuel their reserves. This a meaningful gesture that intimates, “…you are valued, you have a future with this organisation, we want you to continue to grow and develop”.
Other levers available include a salary increase if budgets permit, promotion, or provide other reward mechanisms such as greater flexibility in working arrangements or secondments into other parts of the business so they can expand their repertoire and field of view.
As a recent McKinsey report based on a Global Survey in 2023 has revealed organisations "... may be unintentionally thwarting middle managers’ ability to perform in their roles" as they spend a disproportionate amount of time on administrative and bureaucratic navigation ("Middle Management: A Precious Resource", 2023). Activating some of the measures described above, may go a long way to supporting and re-energising this vital resource who are human beings after all. That has to be a win-win!
