Defining Middle Leadership
Middle leadership is a unique leadership construct including the leadership responsibilities, behaviors, and competencies required by middle managers to perform as leaders in the middle of the organizational hierarchy (De Nobile, 2018; Kieran et al., 2020; Pavlopoulos, 2020; Thornton et al., 2018; Wei, 2018). Middle leadership – or “leading from the middle” – is a unique construct different in nature from top-down and bottom-up leadership (Hargreaves & Shirley, 2019, p. 93). Existing literature refers to this construct as “middle leadership” or “middle managers’ leadership” or “middle managers doing leadership;” however, scholars consistently identify this construct as distinct from other organizational leadership constructs, such as front-line supervision, senior leadership, or executive leadership (Alvesson & Jonsson, 2018, p. 43; Gjerde & Alvesson, 2020, p. 125; Guerrero et al., 2020, p. 3; Thornton et al., 2018, p. 208). The extant literature also suggests there are leadership competencies middle managers require to perform as middle leaders, thereby improving employee performance (Alamsjah, 2020; Alvesson & Jonsson, 2018; Hoang et al., 2020; Jaser, 2020; Lleo et al., 2020; Paetzel et al., 2019; Way et al., 2018).
Defining Middle Leadership Competencies
Leadership competencies are leadership-related skills or combinations of skills (Wallace et al., in press). Leadership competencies include individual characteristics, knowledge and skills, and behaviors (Diskiene et al., 2019). Middle leadership competencies are the skills middle managers require to perform as middle leaders (Eva et al., 2019; Lleo et al., 2020; Paetzel et al., 2019). According to Ong and Yaqiong (2018), middle leadership competencies having a direct impact on employee outcomes include “job mastery and continuous learning, employee engagement, resource management, result orientation, teamwork and collaboration, innovation and change management, and people management” (p. 9). Examples of other key middle leadership competencies spanning both professional and human skills include communication, interpersonal and relationship skills, managerial skills, decision-making, collaboration and teamwork, creativity and innovation, change leadership and management, motivating others, sensemaking, strategic thinking and implementation, and many more (Alamsjah, 2020; Alvesson & Jonsson, 2018; Basuki, 2020; Berraies, 2020; Inyang et al., 2018; Kieran et al., 2020; Liang et al., 2018; Mazanek et al., 2018; Ong & Yaqiong, 2018; Sudirman et al., 2019). Middle managers who fail to understand the competencies required to perform as middle leaders may experience decreased employee performance (De Nobile, 2018; Thornton et al., 2018; Wei, 2018).
References
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