Middle Management Motivation: A State of Choked Potential

Middle managers are expected to play a critical role in translating organisational policies and strategies into practice and action. They have an important role in providing information/input to strategy formulation, and in motivating and energising employees at lower levels but studies in some large Indian organisation in both the public and the private sector show that these managers themselves feel like “victims” and experience a sense of powerlessness in their organisations; they are the ones who express the most negative emotions about any organisational change effort; they feel a sense of stagnation in terms of real personal and professional growth inspite of receiving promotions at fairly predictable intervals; they assume a ‘spectator’ rather than an ‘actor’ stance in the organisation; and they do not see themselves as a part of the “real” management. As a result, the middle and senior management performance remains far below the potential. This paper presents the results of a study which was aimed at understanding the world of middle and senior managers. The paper traces the managerial domotivation to (a) organisational Resource Management, (b) Scant attention to structuring issues which cause role fragmentation and segmentation, and a failure to distinguish between specialist roles and truly managerial roles, (c) development of certain skills at middle and senior levels, such as the ability to accomplish work through alliances, reciprocity and exchange, rather than expecting to operate only through formal authority. While several individuals within the organisation intellectually understand the nature of changes required to move towards greater motivation in the long term, organisations persist with pseudo-solutions and practices that compound the problem. The paper examines the dynamics which lead to such perpetuation of the middle management motivation problems. Finally, the paper outlines a set of factors that can contribute to the creation of an enabling work environment.