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The Truth About Middle Managers: Who They Are, How They Work, Why They Matter

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Business books about management are numerous, to say the least, and a large percentage of these books focus on the different theories about management; what works, what doesn't work, and what the future holds for different managerial schools of thought. Many management books are highly skeptical about middle management and some have even suggested that middle management is an institution whose time has passed. But should middle management be tagged in such a negative way? One person who feels differently about middle management and has the research to back his claims is MIT professor Paul Osterman. He wrote The Truth About Middle Managers because he wanted to share his research with the reader; research that flies in the face of the modern- day wisdom saying that middle managers are a thing of the past and should be eliminated from most businesses as quickly as possible.

I have read some of the negative literature about middle management and why it is supposedly a level of management that needs to be eliminated. I have also debated others on the role of middle management and why it is important to the success of a company. Most take the side that says middle management is a hinderance to corporate efficiency and should be scaled back, but this book has an entirely different point of view. This book takes a stand in favor of middle management and it offers statistics and official research to back its claims. The author has studied management for some time and, according to his research, middle management is not only important, its numbers are increasing. There are a larger percentage of middle managers today than in the past and this trend is likely to continue over time. Many readers will find this difficult to believe, given the talk about eliminating layers of middle management by certain large companies, but there is statistical data to back it up.

Why are middle managers so important? This book offers several reasons why, but it really comes down to one important fact: The critical decisions that middle managers make every day, directly affecting the day- to- day functions of a company. Upper- level management, such as CEO, CFO, CIO, etc., make important decisions, too, but not to the numeric degree that middle managers make decisions and these decisions, taken together, are crucial to the success of any company. I can certainly confirm this, based on my own experience as a middle manager. In my years working in management, I have made hundreds of small decisions. They probably didn't seem like much at the time, but when all of these decisions are added together, they equal a sum that is far greater than the individual parts. The role of middle management is changing and security in the job isn't as good as it was in the past, but there is no denying the importance of this layer of management.

The Truth About Middle Managers is written in a very academic way. Some will find this style a little boring, but as a part- time educator and adjunct professor, I like this writing style and the author is very effective in his delivery. This book is written from an intellectual angle and there is no doubt that the author obviously knows what he is talking about. He is not only intelligent, but his delivery is logical and reasonable. I also like that this book defends the importance of middle managers. Far too many books bash middle management and claim this level of management is on the way out, even though reality paints an entirely different picture.

The Truth About Middle Managers is a very good, very well- written volume about middle management and the importance of maintaining a middle management level in all companies. Middle management makes important decisions on a daily basis and these decisions can have a significant impact on a businesses' bottom line. This book discusses the importance of middle management, its changing role, and its future with a good deal of efficiency. It is a little on the dry side, but the academic nature of this book makes it a good choice for those who want to know the facts and want some tools to guide them as they make future management decisions.

When I chose this book, I though that as a middle manager, I would gain some insight into my work niche, but I find having finished it, that I don't feel that I learned much. I am guessing that this book is better directed to HR employees/managers, and that they might get more out of the graphs and statistics that I did.

The book ends, seemingly in the same place it begins, saying that most middle managers are committed to their jobs and colleagues, but that they have lost much of their commitment to their firms and are suspicious of upper management. But...isn't this true of the workforce as a whole? Aren't we all, management or no, recognizing that there is no loyalty to be had from most companies and that upper management (speaking here of CEOs in particular) is living in an entirely different universe than the average American worker?

Again, I am perhaps not the right audience for this book, but I just didn't find much that was enlightening regarding either my day to day life or career as a middle manager. Times have changed for employees, on all levels of the org chart.

I did find one section that really struck home, though. In defining "middle managers" - Osterman does it well. "Middle managers are responsible for both internal and external management of teams, act as the transmission belt between the top of the organization and the bottom, and make day-to-day choices and trade-offs that escape the attention of top management yet are central to the organization's performance."

Too true, too true.

Reading Paul Osterman's book 'The Truth About Middle Managers' gave me a sense of frustration and hope with the future state of Middle Managers and American business.

Osterman gives us a very close view of middle managers, historically, from the growth of middle management ranks and through the changes that bring us to today.

We have a view of the first really strong organization that was General Motors and the changes that occurred to have middle managers be the glue that kept large matrix organizations with its many divisions humming. We see the changes and the way things were after WWII in the 50s and 60s where there was 'lifetime' employment and the pyramid to todays more flatter organization.

Paul Osterman looks at Managers from a number of industries and interviews a few to get a composite of how managers look at their new opportunity or plight. He shares with us the impact and insights on those managers who have gone through reorganizations and mergers and acquisitions. What changed, what was better and what was worse or just what was different.

He then shows us the perspective of managers and their careers and views of the future and the organization. Telling is the disparity of top management pay with all others and the view that managers old and new have of the organizaions they work for. I was surprised to see that managers look more at loyalty to their team verses that of the overall company today. Also, instead of upward mobility, we have breadth or at least the opportunity to continous growth on a professional level with new things coming all the time.

Whether there is a 'what have you done for me lately?' perspective or loyalty for what you have done for a company, Middle Management has been and still is a very important part of organizations today.

This is a great book for addition to management studies. Anyone in middle management, HR, Training and Development and business consulting would want this in their library. Osterman gives us views from so many angles and this could really lead to new and deeper work on the subject. Enjoy reading 'The Truth About Middle Managers.'

THE TRUTH ABOUT MIDDLE MANAGERS (2008) by Paul Osterman is short, only 188 pages long, and contains seven tables and eight graphs. The raw data for assembling this book took the form of about 50 interviews with middle managers from two companies, with multiple interviews taken with 12 of the interviewees. The book is a quick read as it does not dwell much on specifics. Because it is short on specifics, the best reading audience is persons with a few years of corporate experience, that is, persons having working experience with managers. The book is a mirror, serving to confirm that one's own experiences have indeed happened to others, and to confirm that one's perception of one's own experiences are indeed correct.

STEREOTYPES.

We learn of various stereotypes of middle managers, some more, some less accurate:
(1) We were hiring people just to read the reports of people who had been hired to write reports (page 2). Middle managers are checker who check the checkers. "It's madness." (page 26).

(2) Senior management makes decisions, decides which markets to enter, with whom to merge, how much to invest, what technologies to use, while middle management executes those decisions (pages 5, 6, 66).

(3) Middle managers "tend their own garden and do little more." (page 10).

(4) Middle managers coordinate production, distribution, purchasing, packaging, and facilitates flows of materials, funds, and ideas (pages 18, 19, 20). Middle managers mediate between teams and divisions, and between the organization and its customers (page 71), negotiating between teams (page 74), play ambassadorial roles across teams (page 91).

(5) Bloating of a company with too many middle managers can occur because senior managers have an incentive to hire more middle managers (because this will increase the salary of the senior manager) (page 31). The author observes that where there are too many middle managers, this can be "an obstacle to efficient production." (page 27).

(6) Middle managers are either (a) helpless employees (page 152), (b) loyal slaves, (c) vicious political animals (page 152), (d) automatons (page 39), (e) have a "craft attitude" towards their work (page 152), (f) "intrapeneurs" who express their creativity (page 39), or (g) no longer have a structured job description, but spend more time in ad hoc teams and working in cross-functional tasks or with cross-functional teams (page 62 67).

POOR MANAGEMENT TECHNIQUES.

We learn about well-meaning management techniques that, in Mr. Osterman's opinion, are bad management techniques. These include "personality testing" (page 37), micromanagement techniques such as being required to fill out daily report sheets or checklists, disclosing how various priorities have been fulfilled (pages 86, 87), and "fault oriented" managing, where managers "poke at the gaps, poke at the shortcomings, poke at the deficiencies, and . . . [at] a two-hour meeting, you end up talking about all negative stuff. And as the guys were walking out of the room say, Oh by the way, you did a great job." (page 87). Poor management also results from changes in management, where a person's supervisor keeps changing, where the result is that this "introduces a great deal of noise [meaning useless and inaccurate information] into performance evaluations" (page 109). (I agree completely with the author that these "management techniques" are undesirable and counterproductive.)

INSTABILITY.

Another theme in this book is instability, including career instability and instability within any given company. The author observes that climbing the career ladder has been replaced by hopping from job to job (page 39), that "the classic Organization Man has shrunk if not been eradicated" (page 55). On the plus side, one aspect relating to instability is the concept of "functional chimneys" and that middle managers no longer spend their entire career in one functional chimney, but move across chimneys, e.g., from product design to manufacturing to sales (pages 82, 83, 98, 107). On the negative side, job instability is disclosed as resulting from the breakup of monopolies, e.g., AT&T, rise in competitors, and the consequent inability to engage in massive planning (page 106). Instability also results with changes in supervisors, where any given employee must "figure out the value structure and communication scheme that could change overnight" (page 109), where "the criteria for judging who gets ahead are confused." (page 111).

CONCLUSION.

To conclude, any person who finds himself a victim (or beneficiary) of one or more of the above fact-patterns will find solace from the pages of this book. In other words, the reader will likely find that he or she has experienced at least one of the situations disclosed in this little book, and find consolation by the fact that he or she is not alone. The book does not attempt to find solutions to the above problems - in fact, not all of the situations disclosed in the book are problems. The book's description of present day middle managers is an accomplishment in itself.

This book's jacket promises answers to Who, How and Why middle-management questions, saying TTAMM offers `Truth'. Inside flaps promise some rather sensationalized aspects and problems of Middle Management. "Counterintuitive" revelations are promised. "The truth will surprise you" titillation's dangled. Nothing of the sort is delivered.

To jack up expectations of something new being said an ominous demand is made: "Organizations must recognize this (all that is to be said) and rethink their understanding of this vital workforce segment - now." While all that's actually offered is re-thinking of general common knowledge bromides.

I'm retired. Have been for 29 years. Graduating college, I started at P&G in 1965 and zinged through 11 companies in 15 years, 10 of those years in VP/department-head positions of very big national companies. I then retired, went to Tahiti and haven't thought of corporate things since. I read THE TRUTH ABOUT MIDDLE MANAGERS out of a curiosity of what's happened in the almost 30 years since I bailed.

All this to say that I'm no expert in contemporary middle management issues. I am judging this book far from today's workplace; but I still have friends in high business places and we talk. I am not, to be sure, an Organization Man type.

My overall observation is that this book doesn't keep its promises. What's said seems either common-knowledge or a jumble of unverified generalities. I guess current buzzwords ('silo's, chimney's and ladders' for upward paths, abound) are as frequent as are mostly unsubstantiated conclusions and statistical non sequiturs.

Early-on it's said that the subject is middle management confronting `restructuring'. But discussions relate to restructuring not as much as more psychological and sociological aspects of mid-management circumstances and motivations. Yes, restructuring is occasionally mentioned as unsettling; but so are other business and societal/personal forces.

Seems to me the book's marketing aims to ride down-sizing and the like which are grabbing headlines these days. Re the content and execution of TTAMM, it all seems soft and obvious, repetitious generalized fluff which elicits reactions like "yeah? So?" followed by a shrug and a sigh.

One nice thing is that TTAMM's content can be efficiently/totally gotten by reading the Conclusion paragraphs of each chapter; that's about seven pages. Middle managers or MM Wannabes' time would be better spent reading Forbes, Fortune or Fast Company. Or going to Tahiti to study sunsets.

This book is about middle managers. Who it is aimed at and what it is supposed to do for them I'm not sure. The book discusses "popular opinion" of middle managers (that they have a boring job of no importance and no control) and how middle managers in the 2 firms the author studied feel about their jobs (its stressful, they worry about layoffs, they don't think well of their companies, but they enjoy the "craft" of being a good manager). This book does offer the insight that there is skill to being a good middle manager to those who don't already know it, but beyond that it just doesn't offer much else. The feelings of middle managers in 2 companies just isn't a broad enough base to draw many valid conclusions about middle managers in general.

Having some background in Mid- Managment (in the financial industry, the author makes excellent points that I have experience with, mainly the necessity of many in this business area. Though there have been significant layoffs and cuts since this book was written, one gets the impression that mid-management, even with its shtinking layers, is necessary for improvement, product viability, and competition in today's environment. Though this review is short, the points made in this excellent book area are described in practical detail. In sum, an excellent intro and worthy of being a main feature in MBA classes as well!

In The Truth About Middle Managers (Who they are, How they work, Why they matter), Paul Osterman, explains the transformation of middle managers work (and role) through time and explains some of the common assumptions about middle managers (and whether they are true or just a misconceptions). This book contains a lot of statistics and survey results which is very eye opening. Paul conducted various studies and surveys with managers from big corporations such as AT&T, IBM, GE, Fleet Bank/Bank of America, and a few other companies which name are witheld. And the bottom line is that he is trying to answer the question whether middle managers still matter in today's corporation and economy, and the answer is a resounding yes.

Some of the examples of the common assumption about middle managers:

1. Because of restructuring, midle management have been greatly reduced and job security in nonexistant. While it's true that managerial work is less secure (and the stress level have gone up sharply), the number of managers has increased (and the ratio of middle managers vs non-managers employee has also been increasing).

2. Middle managers are empire builders who do little useful work for their organization. The reality is that middle managers are the glue that hold organization together. They perform specific task themselves and they also lead productive groups. They are also ambassadors between top management and the workforce and between many teams that make organization function

3. The work of middle management has been de-skilled by restructuring. The reality is that work has change in terms of control and breadth. THey are more subject to control of top executives. However, with the flattening of organization, makes their range of task and responsibilities broader and more interesting than in the past

4. Because of layoffs and because of top management seems to be protecting itself, middle managers have lost their sense of loyalty to their employers. They middle managers express a degree of cynicism regarding their employees (and the younger are usually more extreme), however, they do not draw any negative conclusion about how the business operates. They believe layoffs and restructuring are normal and just part of capitalism.

5.Because of this loss of loyalth, middle managers are alienated from their work and have little commitment to what they do. This is not true. Middle managers very much enjoy what they do and have strong commitment to their work. And eventhough they have lost loyalty to their firm, their attachment to what they do and desire to execute well is strong and consistent. Having said that, middle managers are very loyal to immediate colleagues and their work group. "I love my staff"and my loyalties are to the work group" are very typical comments

Keep the faith for all fellow middle managers out there, and always remember to do the right thing!

Sidarta Tanu

Paul Osterman has written a really wonderful book here, and what I liked the most about it was that he has done a lot of really great research, rather than just stuffing it full of anecdotal evidence. Osterman includes a lot of background and historical data on middle managers, some great examples from the business world, and great contemporary information. This was a really fascinating book, and I learned so much! This would be great for any aspiring MBAs, anyone who works in a larger company, or even just someone with a lot of curiosity!

In the opening pages of The Truth About Middle Managers: Who They Are, How They Work, Why They Matter, Paul Osterman writes, "The purpose of this book is to understand what has happened to middle managers as firms restructure." In his well written analysis of data and his research, Osterman advocates for this group in the business world as he describes their changing roles. Being that Mr. Osterman conducted the interviews of 50 middle managers in 2004 and 2005, even though some were interviewed again after the first meeting, I am curious as to how the interviewees might respond today when asked the same questions. I'm also curious as to where these middle managers are today and if they are where they expected to be in 2010. Most of the data presented from the Bureau of Labor Statistics information was dated through 2002, which was the most current at the time of this project. I'd recommend this book to HR individuals, middle managers, CEO's and business students. It contains much data but being that I'm none of the above, I personally enjoyed the transcribed interviews.