Middle Managers are the New Moms

_{Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash}

Written by Jess Kyle

I wish I loved anything as much as society loves to shame and blame mothers for all of our ills.

Haven’t you heard? Everything from autism to gun violence and more is the fault of mothers who are so selfish that they neglect their children’s needs. Or maybe they’re paying too much attention to their children’s needs and coddling them. Or they didn’t breast feed long enough. Or they breast fed too long. Or they work outside the home. Or they don’t.

Whatever the problem is, we look at moms and wonder - loudly and with very shaming language - why they’re getting it so wrong.

Why aren’t you spending more time with your kids? Why did you stop breastfeeding so soon? Why did you go back to work so soon? Why are you trying to have a thriving career when you’ve got kids at home? Why aren’t you volunteering in the classroom more? Why is your baby colicky, don’t you know how to make her happy? Why does your baby sleep so much? Why isn’t your baby sleeping enough? Why do you need special treatment and a flexible schedule just so you can pick your kids up from school, do you see any other parents complaining? Why isn’t your kid on meds, he’s clearly hyperactive? Why would you put your kid on medication instead of just giving him attention?

We don’t seem to hear a lot of questions about the systems within which these moms have to exist, though. For example, why don’t we have paid parental leave in this country? Why is having a baby financially devastating to so many families? Why does childcare cost more than many folks’ mortgage? Why haven’t workplaces adapted with flexible schedules to accommodate parental responsibilities? Why are we accusing moms of being indecent when they breastfeed in public? Why are we just expecting moms to know what to do in any given situation involving their kids, when they haven’t received any kind of training or support?

Managers: The new scapegoats

I am seeing a direct parallel here between how we as a society have talked about mothers for, well, as long as mothers have existed, and how we are beginning to talk about middle managers. The discourse about managers is all over the place right now. Just this year alone, I’ve heard that:

• No one wants to be a manager

• We’re headed for a manager burnout crisis

• Middle managers will be extinct soon

• Toxic managers are often protected by companies

• People don’t leave jobs, they leave bad managers

Many of these conversations seem to agree that burnout is a real problem that seems to be getting worse, that toxic leadership is directly responsible for a good portion of employee attrition, and that being a manager right now pretty much sucks. But wait a minute; if we’re all in agreement about all of that, then why aren’t we collectively making changes to cultivate and nurture the skills, environments, and systems that could turn things around?

What continues to absolutely baffle me is that, in spite of the mountains of data we have showing that trust, empathy, humility, courage, and curiosity are critical for creating the kinds of cultures where teamwork, productivity, and innovation thrive, most companies still haven’t gotten their shit together in the year 2025 and shifted toward rewarding those characteristics. In fact, we seem to be trending in the opposite direction, more or less. More hours, more responsibilities, more pressure, more blurring of the boundaries between work and personal life; less emphasis on the wellbeing of our people, less time to communicate a vision and get everyone on board and aligned, less autonomy, less joy. More self-protection, less vulnerability. More bloviating about values and integrity, less regard for whether incentives, goals, decisions, and strategic direction are aligned with those values.

And whose fault is all of this? Why, middle managers of course! They are the ones who are responsible for keeping their teams happy and productive. If we start losing talent, look no further than the manager - after all, that’s why people leave, right? They’re also the ones responsible for delivering results to leadership and driving progress toward the company’s strategic goals. If we miss the Q4 target, it’s time to clean house and get rid of the managers who didn’t perform - you know, since it’s their job and all.

But isn’t this unfair? We pluck them out of a job they were really good at and may have even loved, and plunge them into management - a completely different job with completely different skill and competency requirements - and say things like, “Let me know if you need anything at all!” when most managers don’t even know what they need. In a great many cases (I don’t have enough data to feel confident saying most cases, but believe me - it’s a great many), managers don’t receive any training or coaching whatsoever, even if it’s their first time managing. There are no programs to inculcate the company’s leadership principles or the expectations around how to handle various scenarios with employees.

Managers are told that they need to be providing regular feedback to their reports, but given no tools or support to actually approach those conversations (which can be fraught and difficult for all kinds of reasons). They’re told that they’re responsible for managing employee performance, but are often forced to grade their team using arbitrary scales or rubrics that artificially organize people into “target bands,” or quotas for what percentage of employees can be considered “exceptional” versus what percentage must be labeled as “meet expectations” or lower. They usually understand that trust is important, but haven’t been coached on the ways that trust is actually built and broken. And, they are told to both model and enforce accountability, but never given the tools to work through the very real things that get in the way (such as chronic shame and complicated office politics that hold some folks accountable while elevating others for bad behavior).

Even in cases where there are formal management training programs, these are often focused on the actual management and delegation of tasks and deliverables rather than “how to People”. This results in managers who can assign their team tasks in Jira and fill out a performance review questionnaire, but can’t have a difficult conversation to save their lives, and don’t know how to show empathy to a struggling team member without rushing in to fix his problems.

The jargon we use to describe managers might be different than that we use to talk about moms, but we are essentially telling these groups the same thing:

We realize that you have pressure from all sides and that there is a lot being asked of you; that you’re tired, anxious, stressed out, and filled with shame about how inadequate you feel; and that you started this endeavor with no idea how to do it and aren’t receiving any type of support beyond what you can provide for yourself. We also see that you’re doing the best you can with what you have, and that your lived experiences heavily shape the way you’re doing this job, for better or worse.

But, your best is nowhere near good enough. You were supposed to know how to do this - either you’re cut out for it, or you’re not. If you can’t support yourself in this, don’t be looking at any of the rest of us to support you; this is YOUR job. YOU are responsible for your results and the happiness of the people who depend on you. If you can’t do it well, then that’s a moral failing on you.

Don’t worry though - we will keep shaming you until you figure it out and are worth a shit.

It’s long past time to stop expecting individuals to be able to solve a systemic problem. Let’s fix the systems that are creating bad managers and give them the right mix of support, coaching, and other resources. Let’s help them work out their communication issues and start liking themselves better, so that they can show up to difficult moments in a way they feel proud of and model the behavior we want to see more of for their teams. Let’s normalize making it ok to want an upwardly mobile career that doesn’t lead to management, if that isn’t what someone wants. Let’s start rewarding the characteristics that we say we value.

And for goodness’ sake, let’s stop shaming managers and blaming them for everything that’s wrong.