The real value of middle managers

THE idea of middle managers as unexceptional, mediocre supervisors has been around for decades—at least since a seminal 1977 article by Abraham Zaleznik in Harvard Business Review that made an explicit distinction between leaders as inspirational visionaries and manager as strategic administrators. These ideas are still dominant today.

Over the course of my career, however, I have developed great respect for middle managers. They are the engine of the business, the cogs that make things work. And as remote and hybrid work arrangements take over, middle managers are more important than ever. The most effective ones are in possession of humane, sophisticated communications skills and the knack to mediate and find common grounds between actors at different levels in the organization.

This is why I believe that the division between leadership and management increasingly sounds anachronistic. It is time to reunite leadership and management in one concept, and recognize middle managers as connecting leaders.

Connecting leaders have the hard task of being both proactive leaders to direct reports and engaged followers to the top management. Current ideas of leadership and training fail to capture this complex double act. For example, executive development programs focus on teaching leadership skills so managers can influence direct reports, largely ignoring the development of their upward influence skills. But it is directly through these double upward and downward influence activities that connecting leaders can shrink hierarchical distance and bring multiple levels of an organization together.

Based on years of research on this topic, I have identified four functions that are characteristics of successful connecting leaders:

The connecting leader as janus:

n Essentially, this means engaging with the concerns of both upward and downward partners in an organization. This ability to look simultaneously up and down the hierarchy allows connecting leaders to empathize with the burdens of both sides. The greatest risks for Janus leaders are burnout and emotional labor. Because connecting leaders consistently empathize with many different people at different levels of the organization, it is important they guard their energy. Organizations can mitigate the toll by offering coaching and psychological support for managers to discuss, become aware and overcome their cognitive and emotional burden.

The connecting leader as broker:

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Because hierarchical levels have often different agendas, goals and needs, connecting leaders can serve as interpreters of these needs, brokering interlevel dialogue between the people above and below them. The greatest risk for such leaders is encountering an uncooperative or unavailable executive, or one who is challenging to win over. It’s also possible that, in attempting to bridge different parts of the organizational hierarchy, misunderstandings might occur. To address this, an organization and top leadership can foster a culture of transparency and humility, where top leadership accepts open-door engagement with lower parts of the organization and embraces problems with a sense of understanding.

The connecting leader as a conduit:

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Conduits courageously amplify the voices of their direct reports upward. In many cases, these are constructive challenges to those in positions of power that can both trickle up in a mediated way or also be directly communicated from the bottom to the top. We know from previous research that in order to speak up, organizations need to foster a culture of psychological safety. This type of culture is vital for connecting leaders, who often have to speak up on behalf of others and encourage their employees to speak up themselves.

The connecting leader as a tightrope walker:

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Finally, this last practice requires critically appraising and balancing dilemmas. The different, even opposite, needs and demands from upper and lower levels place the connecting leader in front of a myriad predicaments each day. For example, imagine having to design redundancy schemes while simultaneously keeping the people on a team motivated. It's a constant balancing act, requiring connecting leaders to walk along a rope between hierarchical layers. Risks to this include cognitive overload, confusion and slow action. It is important these risks are mitigated by offering middle managers safe spaces for debate, where the pros and cons of certain decisions can be discussed with peers from other parts of the company.

In addition to the mitigators discussed above, there are three other measures organizations and executives need to take to cultivate connecting leaders. Without them, leaders may feel as if doing and saying what’s necessary is just too perilous:

n Get company buy-in to support risk-taking:

Executives' buyin is important because much of what connecting leaders do is risky. Speaking up for others requires exposing oneself to the top of the organization, as well as possibly disappointing the bottom. Executives need to be prepared to aid connecting leaders by fostering an environment of psychological safety. The communications and human resources departments also need to work together to update companywide language—for example, on balanced score cards, hiring competencies lists and contracts—to reflect the importance of connecting behaviors.

Create development programs:

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Development programs should be dedicated to unpacking, explaining and training the abilities associated to each of the four practices. They should teach not just how to influence those lower in the hierarchy but also those higher in rank. You might design workshops that include managers from different levels sharing and reflecting on the difficulties of speaking up, of influencing from below and of linking hierarchical levels. When I have run these types of sessions in organization, I have seen transformation in the room and a sense of pride in being skilled at upward influencing.

Invest in better emotional support:

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Connecting leaders are often pulled in two directions, with emotional and cognitive costs. It is therefore important to offer this population extra support, like coaching and spaces for safe conversations and sharing. This is crucial for their success.

As hierarchies within companies become more fluid and virtual, middle managers will increasingly become channels for relationships, influence and connection. For companies to be successful coming out of the pandemic, they need to recognize the complex and multifaceted roles of middle managers, who are not just visionary, inspirational leaders, but also courageous, engaged followers. Their ability to perform both upward and downward roles effectively requires them to develop very sophisticated, humane skills to bring together the layers of your organization.