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FullText of my paper, please don't use it or take it anywhere, thanks!
PS, to my class- I went with a lighter shade of purple for my blog- keeping with my purple posts on the Sakai forum so that you could still read it ;D
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Christina Dufour
LSC 502: Management
Middle Management Paper:
Throughout
the study of library management, we have learned a lot about being at the head
of a library, a bit about those who serve under the leader, and not a lot about
“middle managing”. What exactly is the
vision of “the middle”? While the
hierarchical pyramid makes this position clear, it does not necessarily give us
any foresight into what the “middle” deals with. We have learned of tactics that can create a
strong manager, and much of the focus in the employed field rests on these
people, but what about an empowered employee?
Is that at all important to an organization? What do these positions, these people, look
like? Using the theories and ideas of
Stueart & Moran, Mr. Williams, Ian Smith, and Mr. Winchell, I hope to shed
some light on this topic and figure out just how important these people
are.
To
determine what the “middle” is, we
have to start with creating a framework.
A “Google search” will tell you that “the middle” is anything from a TV
show to a social position or even a philosophical stance. That is not helpful. Dictionary.com defines the “middle” as “1.
equally distant from the extremes or outer limits; central: the middle point of
a line; the
middle singer in a trio. 2. intermediate or intervening: the middle distance.
3. medium or average: a man of middle size. 4. ( initial capital letter ) (in
the history of a language) intermediate between periods classified as Old and
New or Modern: Middle English. ”(Dictionary.com, 2012) In simpler terms, it is neither the top nor
the bottom but a way to connect the two.
Now
that we have defined the dictionary term of “the middle,” what does it mean if
one manages from the middle? Middle
management is part of a whole, the “whole” being the hierarchical system. A hierarchical system is a format for which
an organization or business can structure their employees. Stueart & Moran outline the workforce of
a business in the following terms “[a picture of a pyramid, starting at small
top] Top Management[:] Directors and Associate Directors Set policies for the
entire organization and are responsible for its overall management. Middle Management [:] Department Heads and
Branch Librarians Carry out policies set by upper management and are
responsible for management of subunits of the organization. First-Line
Supervisors [:] Lead the activities of the individual workers in carrying out
the day-to-day work of the organization.”(Stueart & Moran, 2007, p.7) Furthermore, Stueart & Moran add that
middle managers “also serve as liaisons between top management and
supervisors.”(Stueart & Moran, 2007, p.7)
One could assume that, if an organization was set up in this style, that
the middle managers are indeed important.
These people may be department directors or a leader of a subunit of the
organization. Managing from the middle,
or even managing at all, even has a broad way of being interpreted. For example, David K. Williams posted an
article, or blog, about how he feels organizations should not even had
managers, but rather they should have leaders.
Williams says that “From the top down, every employee has the
opportunity to lead” and rather than have a controlling upper management,
employees need to be “trusted” and “empowered”.(Williams, 2012) His company, Fishbowl, is set up in what he
more or less calls a flat hierarchy, with a manager/leader, three pairs of
teams, and people after them. His policy
is open door, but he highly insists they bounce ideas off of each other first
before coming to him and, at that, they must have a series of possible
scenarios.(Williams, 2012) Williams has
other articles like this and all of them work on taking the top of the pyramid
out. So why then has there been, or is
there still, a management from the top approach?
What does a person at the top of
the pyramid do? Stueart & Moran say
that this person “is responsible for the overall functioning of the entire
organization…managers at the highest levels have the power to establish
organization-wide policy and are influential in setting the leadership style
throughout the organization.”(Stueart & Moran, 2007, p.7) Ian Smith agrees with this idea. A manager, or leader, is the person that can
do the bold thing. “What is important is
that [organizations], their managers and their leaders are bold in whatever way
fits the circumstances and needs of their [organization] and the times that
they are in.”(Smith, 2008) In a library,
a manager, also known as a director, is usually held responsible for
understanding their library communities’ needs, staffing, training, and
organizational change. With one person
calling the shots, these businesses have seemed to get along just fine. Until now.
There is an acknowledgement that
technology demands are rising and the field of librarians must either adapt or
perish. Smith, with the inspiration of
Wendy Shultz, outlines several key societal factors in this process, “a general
acceleration in the pace of change; the ubiquity of technological innovation;
expanding educational formats and opportunities; changing workplace structures
and ethics; altered worker demands; and changes in customer expectations and
lifestyles.”(Smith, 2008) So how can a
manager adapt to these problems of their future? Perhaps the have to first define the
challenges of managing from the middle.
Whether a manager is new to their
employees or they have been there for a long time, the goal of an organization
can change as time goes on. To solve the
breakdown of the unified goal, several things must occur. There must be motivation, communication,
innovation, and leadership. These are
the troubles areas that may experts of this field discuss. One challenge is that, to lead successfully,
one must first realize that “there is no one right approach. There must be flexibility to meet the need of
different employees.”(Stueart & Moran, 2007, p.273) This creates questions for a leader about how
best to involve their employees, how much or how little to involve them in the
planning process, and how best to delegate the tasks they need done. To do this, the employee must be motivated to
positively respond to their leader. In
turn, the leader must figure out how best to motivate them. What does motivating an employee mean? Motivation is easy to gain when a person
finds a job they want to do. But what
should happen if that employee is working for a manager that does not help them
advance in their career? What would
happen if the director they worked for was constantly pushing them further up
in the job pyramid? Stueart & Moran
have four areas that they suggest will keep motivation flowing for a manager:
“individual difference…a whole person…motivated behavior…value of a
person.”(Stueart & Moran, 2007, p.302)
In other words, a manager must first acknowledge the employee as
fundamentally different from any other employee that is higher and that what
works “best” will change. Second, a
middle manager should work to invest in the “whole person,” they should be
concerned with the development of a better human. Reflecting on people as individuals, a
manager should understand the psychology of what motivates a person- whether
realistic or not. And, lastly, an
employee should feel valuable to their organization as well as respected. These four pieces are hard for a busy
employer, but it would make for a good one at any level.
Communication is another challenging element. A middle manager is especially important in
this step. They must communicate both to
the people above and below them. They must exchange messages, work to keep up
relationships- both business and personal within their field- and uphold “written,
oral, and nonverbal” communication(Stueart & Moran, 2007, p.367) Working alone, the work done must be
communicated to the group and, when working in teams, the goal of the
organization must be in the forefront.
This area results in conflict if communication is not withheld. As mentioned before, a middle manager has a
lot to deal with here.
How does
innovation affect the middle manager?
Let’s look at an example from Geoffrey of The Public Manager.
“There must be a thousand definitions for
and examples of innovation - from the latest cellular technology to improving
educational practices. How do we know which to apply? In his 2008 master's
thesis describing the Coast Guard's innovation program, Lieutenant Commander
Chris Kluckhuhn of the U,S, Coast Guard Reserves uses a definition adopted from
the government of New Zealand: Innovation: The creation, development, and
implementation of a new product, process or service, aimed at improving
efficiency, effectiveness, or competitive advantage.
Innovation may be applied to products,
services, manufacturing processes, managerial processes or the design of an
organization. Both the organization and employees must be engaged for
innovation to occur. First, the organization must establish goals and
guidelines. Then it should empower people to take risks to find the best
solutions. “
This article
highlights that everyone must be involved in the process of change. This is something that seems to come up on a
regular basis. Much like Williams noted
earlier, employees must feel empowered and trusted in order to contribute.
Leadership is the fourth most important part of middle managing. A director that uses the hierarchical pyramid
must understand that they cannot run the organization alone, in other words
that they cannot control every aspect by themselves. In this case, the director has to make sure
that they have established both a professional and personal bond with their
employees. They have to be able to
understand how best to move forward. A
middle manager should be able to be responsible for their department without
having to go to the top of the pyramid, this means taking action, addressing
misconduct, and understanding the boundaries.
Winchell says that
“Supervisors who are confident in taking
conduct- or performance-based actions have made every reasonable effort to
establish a work environment in which employees can excel. They document that
inappropriate conduct or deficient performance has been made known to the
employee and is within the employees control to correct.”(Winchell, 2011)
Should a middle
manager be able to measure their workers performance and their workers(as
people) then they may be able to sift through motivation, communication,
innovation, and leadership.
References
Smith, I. (2008). People management – be
bold! Library Management, 29 (1-2), 18-28.
Williams, D. (2012, July 10). The End of Middle Managers (And Why They'll Never Be Missed). Forbes.
Retrieved from; http://www.forbes.com/sites/davidkwilliams/2012/07/10/the-end-of-middle-managers-and-why-theyll-never-be-missed/
Peter, A. (1989). Middle Managers. Institute of Public
Administration of Canada. 191.
Stueart, R.D., & Moran, B. B. (2007).
Library and information center management (7th ed.). Westport, CT:
Libraries Unlimited.
Geoffrey , A.(2011). So Satisfying:
Leading from the middle in the Coast Guard. The
Public Manager, 40(3), 20-25.
Winchell, T. E., Sr. (2011). Distasteful
duties: Maintaining order and discipline. The Public Manager, 40(3),
50-54.
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