Stuck in the Middle

4 TIPS FOR C LEVEL EXECUTIVES TO EMPOWER THE MIDDLE MANAGER

I often think that being a “middle manager” may be the worst place to be in the organizational hierarchy.    I often have middle managers in my leadership classes who complain that they feel stuck in the role of go-betweener.  They feel as though the purpose they serve is to act as a buffer between employees and upper management without the authority to make key decisions that they feel are best for their people and the company.

I recently saw this happening to a middle manager that told me, “I feel like I can’t do my job for fear of losing my job.” One individual was going around him to complain to the C level executive. Instead of the CEO asking the middle manager for his take on the situation, the CEO threw him under the bus and changed a decision that had already been made in order to please the complainer.  This middle manager was stuck in a place where he wasn’t empowered to make his own decisions about how to handle his unit of work for fear that his boss would change the decision.   Instead of thinking,  “What is best for this employee or my people?” he was stuck in the “What would my boss think?” mentality even when he knew his boss didn’t have all the facts.

I offered this person up some advice for improving his situation, but today I’d rather address what C level leaders should do to empower middle managers and get them out of the “stuck” position:

1. Set the vision and mission and give examples of how this should affect decision making for your middle managers.
2. Regularly communicate with your middle managers. Do not create an environment where you are only talking to them when something goes wrong.
3. If someone comes to you with a complaint about their manager, ask them if they have discussed the issue with their manager. Unless it is an issue related to harassment, direct that person back to their immediate manager to discuss and resolve.  Emphasize that their manager is the decision maker and that you are there to support him/her.
4. If there are frequent issues of people coming around their manager to discuss issues with you, examine why this is happening and have a candid conversation with this manager. It may be that you are micromanaging decision making instead of empowering and teaching your middle managers to be leaders instead of the go-between.

When have you had someone override a decision you made and how did it make you feel?  What was the result of the decision being changed?