Being promoted to a management position used to be viewed as a way to move up the “ladder” at a company – more responsibility, more perks and higher pay.
However, the average person has no interest in being a manager anymore.
Writing for www.entrepreneur.com, Ryan Wong’s company recently conducted a survey of 1,000 full-time workers across the United States who are not in a management position. Only 38% indicated that they are interested in managing people at their current place of employment. The finding rang true across industries and borders.
“We’re seeing clients in all lines of work struggling to fill frontline management positions,” noted Wong.
Businesses have to adapt in order to fill these middle management positions. Wong described, “Imagine a tower made from the Jenga game blocks. You can only remove so many blocks from the middle before the top comes crashing down.”
Yes, there was a time when a manager title meant some prestige, respect, an opportunity to lead and grow, and a potential pathway to an even higher position. That dynamic has been shifting for decades, according to Wong.
Why the backlash? A major reason is that trust in leaders has eroded sharply, according to Wong. Only 21% of workers strongly agreed that they trusted their company's leadership. The number has been on the decline since the pandemic.
At the same time, the ‘individual contributor’ in the workplace has enjoyed increasing status in many circles, especially in the tech community. Their pay and perks may be comparable to those of managers without ever having to wrestle with the challenges that go along with supervising people.
Also, pressure on managers is growing. Familiar challenges with delivering results and bottom-line value have been augmented in recent decades with mounting responsibilities for human resource-related issues. For many, the stress and time commitment of management outweigh any added benefits.
Wong pointed to one particular finding of his survey: people see managerial responsibilities as a non-starter for work-life balance. Forty percent of those surveyed said their biggest worry with becoming a manager was increased stress, pressure and hours. When people were asked to identify their top ambition, 67% said it was spending more time with their friends and families. The lowest priorities were becoming an executive (4%) and becoming a people manager (9%).
“As companies struggle with disruptions from AI, increasing automation and a tight labor market,” identified Wong, “clear leadership is needed more than ever, but it’s getting hard to find.”
How can companies fill the ‘missing middle’ – and make management jobs something their employees aspire to?
Wong suggested that one important step is to redefine the meaning of a manager. This is partly about reconceptualizing the role. The tech industry, for example, has popularized “player-coaches” – employees who continue to contribute as individuals while also leading small teams of workers. The balance can be challenging to strike, but the upside is sustained engagement with your field and the growth of new management skills.
Companies are also finding new ways to value management. When McKinsey asked middle managers what they wanted more of, the obvious answer was bonuses. In a competitive market, many businesses are awarding signing bonuses to attract talent. According to a 2021 survey, 43% of hiring managers were offering more paid time off and 40% were offering better job titles to win the war for talent. It's not all about perks, however. Middle managers also said they wanted to be rewarded with increased autonomy and more responsibility.
Another critical step is to help managers handle increased responsibilities with better technology. Think of the tools that will enable managers to extend their areas of supervision or control while reducing toil and grunt work. This is where good data, Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) and other software can help identify problem areas or opportunities for efficiency.
Managers need time and resources to do their jobs effectively and happily. If they don’t, people will continue to have reservations about taking management positions.
