Tips for Middle Managers Episode Recap

Navigating the corporate ladder can be a challenging endeavor, especially for those stuck in the middle – yes, we’re talking about the middle managers. Those unsung heroes who serve as the crucial conduits between the vision of upper-level management and the groundwork by front-line employees. Their role, while often underappreciated, is vital to the success and harmony of any organization.

Recently, on the Two Marketing Moms Podcast, Kelly Callahan-Poe and Carli Sidoti, founder of Buttoned Up Consulting, shed some light on this pivotal role. They discussed the intricacies of middle management in the advertising and marketing industries and offered sage advice for those looking to excel in these positions.

Middle managers often carry the weight of daily operations on their shoulders, performing a balancing act that involves a mix of implementing plans, managing budgets and timelines, and overseeing marketing campaigns. All this while ensuring that the needs of both the clients and the agency are being met. It’s a high-pressure role that not only requires shrewd business acumen but also exceptional interpersonal skills. Because, as Carli pointed out, middle management is essentially about relationship management.

The Challenges of Middle Management

The path of a middle manager is fraught with its own unique set of challenges. For one, there’s the issue of visibility. Middle managers are key players who ensure that the company’s operations run smoothly, yet they often go unnoticed.

Politics, power dynamics, and stakeholder conflicts pose another significant hurdle for middle managers. With so many different interests to balance – including those of senior management, vendors, external partners, and various departments – it takes skilled diplomacy and careful negotiation to manage these relationships successfully.

Here are some practical tips for middle managers looking to excel and get noticed:

1. Develop a Strong Skill Set

• Technical Know-How: Stay on top of the latest trends and techniques within your industry.
• People Skills: Build relationships and resolve conflicts with empathy and understanding.
• Delegation Mastery: Understand that you can’t do everything and delegate tasks accordingly.

2. Increase Your Visibility

• Speak Up: Share your achievements and those of your team with upper management.
• Networking: Cultivate relationships within and beyond your immediate environment.

3. Strategic Networking

• Find Mentors: Seek the guidance of experienced professionals who’ve navigated through middle management.
• Be a Mentor: Similarly, offer your assistance to those less experienced, building a network of mutual support.

4. Balance Politics with Diplomacy

• Develop Emotional Intelligence: Recognize, understand, and manage your emotions and those of others.
• Practice Tactical Transparency: Communicate openly while being strategic about what information to share and when.
• Focus on Results: Aim for tangible outcomes that contribute to the company’s success, which helps in cutting through the political noise.

Remember, while you can’t make everyone happy, staying focused on your job, your team, and the larger goals of your company will guide you through. Juggling the expectations and realities of middle management is not easy, but neither is it impossible. It’s an extraordinary opportunity to show leadership while still being a learner, and a powerful position from where you can truly impact the trajectory of your company’s success.

The main takeaway? Middle management success hinges on the right combination of skills, visibility, and strategic networking. No middle manager is an island, and it is through connection and collaboration that you will find your path to recognition and achievement.

Tips for Middle Managers Episode Transcript

Kelly Callahan  

Welcome to the Two Marketing Moms Podcast. I’m Kelly Callahan-Poe and I’m joined by Carli Sidoti, the founder of Buttoned Up Consulting. Today Carli and I are going to talk about Tips for Middle Management Success. Both Carli and I have spent a significant portion of our career as middle managers. Middle managers play a crucial role in organizations bridging the gap between top level management and frontline employees. But it takes the right combination of skills, visibility and strategic networking to help middle managers get noticed. Carli, how would you define middle management in advertising or marketing?

Carli Sidoti 

Oh, gosh, there’s so many descriptions about of middle management in the ad industry and marketing industry. But I think of I would say is because I was in middle management for so long, I think of middle management as the position between senior management and the frontline staff, the day to day, people kind of, full on a lot of the weight. But we as middle managers, again, I’m referring to us “we” middle managers carry out so much, but we’re responsible for a lot of things like implementing marketing plans, managing budgets, timelines, all the marketing campaigns, analyzing trends, doing some research. So, it’s really making sure that all the marketing activities aligned with what the client’s expectations are, what the goals are, for the client’s business, but then also the agency, your own organization, you need to make sure that you are adhering to what the agency is expected to do. So, it’s a lot of pressure. But then there’s also the relationship aspect. So, in addition to all the work that you’re doing day to day, you are managing the relationship with the clients, you kind of are the face of the agency, or the face of your organization, if you think about it, because you’re the one that’s doing all of the work behind the scenes, working with your internal team, your research, creative, media, and then you report all that back to the client. So, I see it a lot of managing client relationship, and then you’re also managing that interim relationship. So, it’s again, like a whole relationship game dealing with people of all different types of personalities, and fire drills, who needs what, it’s a lot of trying to make everybody happy. That’s kind of the where I fell into that once where I thought, oh, I have to make everybody happy. What my team did, they want my clients to like me, and that was a mark I got on a lot of my reviews was you can’t make everybody happy, you got to do a job. But making everybody happy isn’t the top priority. So that’s just a tip I can give to a lot of the middle managers out there. Don’t take it to heart. Just keep doing what you’re good at. Because it’s a lot of pressure.

Kelly 

Well, that leads into the next question, which is what are some of the biggest challenges? But just to kind of reiterate, basically, on the advertising side, the account director would be middle management, right, or an account supervisor? And on the marketing side, it might be in a marketing director. So, you’re not VP level quite yet. You have people underneath you; you have people above you, you’re just in the middle. And so, let’s talk a little bit about those challenges. And I found this quote from the co-founder of Intel Andrew S. Grove and he said, “Middle managers are the muscle and bone of every sizeable organization no matter how loose or flattened the hierarchy, but they are largely ignored, despite their important immense importance to our society and economy.” And I thought, wow, that is so true, because middle managers are really not often seen as having a big position of power. And so frequently, they get tripped up by politics, or they’re completely dismissed by senior manager, their peers and even people who are less senior than they are. And so, to me, that’s the biggest challenge for middle managers is relating to navigating organizational, inter departmental stakeholder politics and conflicts and overall power dynamics. And that comes in many different, avenues, it can be everything from managing relationships with so many different stakeholders, with vendors with external partners, balancing interests of the different departments, managing upwards, managing downwards, manages sideways, competing priorities, differing goals, and navigating all of that, diplomatically and recognizing that, that people may or may not have the same goals and objectives that you do. And so, there’s a lot of challenges and those power dynamics can frequently become power struggles between you and the other departments or individuals, because everyone wants to secure their own interests. Everyone wants support for their individual marketing initiatives or their team’s success and not everyone is frequently on the same page. It’s on the politics side of things, right Carli?

Carli

It can be tough. And I hope a lot of people listening right now are going that’s me. You know, like, that is exactly what I’m going through right now. Because it’s relatable to so many people. You’re not to be in the ad industry, but you can you could work for a big brand and be in the marketing department or another industry altogether. But wherever you are, there’s going to be a power struggle, or those political dynamics that kind of leaves you feeling like, well, should I say something? Am I going to come up? You know, if I say something, am I going to come across too brash? And can I lose a relationship with this person who thought so well of me? So, you kind of have to talk to, I would suggest talking to a trusted mentor within the organization to say like, look, I’m having this struggle. What should I do? Or what have you done in the past? So, a trusted senior advisor to say, like, here’s what’s going on, what do you think? Because I’ve gotten advice to from other peers, and trusted mentors within an organization when I’ve been a little lost and, okay, do I tiptoe around this person? Or do I just kind of keep my head down and, and say, well, this is the way it’s supposed to be. And usually, they would give me advice and say, well, that person is who they are, Carli. So, you’re just going to have to deal with it. But if I don’t like it, I’ve learned the more experience I got in my career, I spoke up more. Because the point where I thought, you know what, there’s nothing to lose. It’s, a job, but it’s also my dignity. And I wanted to be seen as somebody who was working my way up in my career. So, if I wanted to be seen, I needed to be heard. So, if you are struggling in an issue with power politics, think about where do you want to go? And use your voice for that? However, you want, wherever you want to go, if that makes sense.

Kelly 

Sure. And what are what other challenges are you seeing out there for middle managers beyond the politics side of things?

Carli

So, there were two things that I struggled with a lot when I was researching this topic with you. And one was balancing strategic vision with day-to-day operations, because this is something that I got dinged for all the time in my reviews with my supervisor, it was Carli, you are kick ass with the day to day, the efficiency that everything done so fast and perfectly. Which I love. I love getting that. But you never have any room or time to work on the strategy. You don’t have time. And I thought, well, yeah, I don’t have time because I’m so busy doing the day-to-day stuff. So, it was okay, well, what do we do? Do we hire somebody to help you? And if so, is that going to give you the time to focus on strategy. And I knew that I have that part of my brain, I was able to work on strategy. I just didn’t turn it on all the way. Because I think I was addicted to and loved the day to day and the fast pace. So that was my struggle. So, I wonder if other people I’m curious to hear from some of your audience, do they struggle with that also? Or are they like, get me out of the weeds, I want to do this strategy. Because that was that was something tough for me. And then a second thing that I think a lot of middle management has to work through is managing the diverse teams. And that comes with, at least in my experience, working at an advertising agency work with so many different departments, the production team creative research, and most of the time, we all got along, but there will be times where somebody just cannot take any more on their plate. They can’t take people, they’re like, stop talking to me going in my corner. And you just kind of have to figure it out. How do you defuse a situation? If there is an argument between your creative director and a producer? I talked to both of them separately. It’s like being a parent, it’s a mom, you’re being you’re being a parent. And yeah, you are a hand holder. And I talk about that a lot with my team, when I worked at the agency we have to your hand holder, you have to hold hands because we are the glue that brings everybody together. And we carry the load and get none of the recognition. But this is us. This is middle management. 

Kelly 

And you see that the most in the advertising world between creative and suits, right, where you have more of that kind of personality conflict because our brains are built a little differently, left brain versus right brain and you want to be able to see each point of view. And sometimes it’s it takes a lot of time and effort to be able to see both points of view but it’s important to interview especially as a middle manager. 

Carli

It is and the beautiful things you can do when you all get along and you can kind of humbly sit back and go I had a lot to do with that you know If you want to win an award, or if you get recognition from leadership, just know you did that, put it on your portfolio, put it in your development plan, when you meet with your supervisor and say, I was part of this, I was responsible for this.

Kelly 

Yeah. What about resistance to change and adaptability, that’s always a big challenge as well, isn’t it?

Carli

It is. And it could be different with each personality type of middle management. So, for me, as type A, I have my structure, I, I kind of open to change a little bit, but I kind of do what I have to do to keep the task at hand. So, whatever I have to do to make sure the job gets done, essentially. But I don’t know if I could think of any other good examples of that. What about you?

Kelly 

Well, we talked a lot about this in previous podcast, the pivot, remember the pivot that we did in that during COVID, the COVID pivot, and see like the world has changed triple since then, with AI. And so, we’re constantly having to be adaptable. So, we can no longer in advertising, do an annual plan, for example, you have to start to plan quarterly, because so much is changing in the marketplace. And that makes work four times as much, and communication even more challenging. So, making sure that people are not afraid of change and are open to change and, you know, changes in the environment, changes in the media, changing media habits and open to those things. It’s really a big part of middle managers jobs. 

Carli

That’s true. And expecting the unexpected. It’s like the same thing. All of a sudden, a client’s budget can be like, yeah, we don’t have our money, stop everything you’re doing. And we’ll tell you what to do next. And you’re just sitting there like, oh, my gosh, what about our projections for the agency that passed? 

Kelly 

Are you going to make your awareness numbers? How are you going to be prepared for that. And being malleable and adaptable is a big part of being a strong manager, budget allocations, timing, those sorts of things. Time sheets, that’s another big one that causes a lot of stress and a lot of conflict, making sure that people appropriately build their time to the appropriate jobs, and you know, are not padding their time. And, making sure that budget allocations are dealt with right away with the clients. And there’s no issues about going over budget and giving clients a heads up is a huge thing as well.

Carli

Definitely, because that impacts the agency’s bottom line, also, you’re hurting the agency, if you’re padding your time. Yeah. You know, you can get screwed if the client all of a sudden is like, I need to see all of your numbers versus your hours and procurement gets involved. So, you never want to lie. You never you just kind of want to do what’s right. So, the agency gets paid for what they are supposed to get paid for. And then the clients sees, okay, I have a trusted partner, who’s giving me the value that I’m asking for.

Kelly 

Because those numbers are used for projections in the future. So, they’re important that they’re accurate. You know, there’s also things like influence and persuasion. How do you build effective communication and negotiating and building consensus among those diverse groups, and I think that’s another component of the diversity aspect and managing diverse teams that you talked about. And so are you managing perceptions about suits versus creatives or this department versus that department, you have your own reputations and your own perceptions, and you have to be able to navigate those dynamics and make sure that your department itself, builds credibility is known as you know as department that can deliver. I’ve established trust that you’ve demonstrated leadership that you are able to gain support for your marketing efforts. So that that, to me is another big huge one. That falls on the shoulders of the middle manager.

Carli

Yeah, you want people to want to work with you. You don’t want people to dread when they’re like, Oh, I gotta work on Carli on that project. I hope nobody’s ever said that about me. But yeah, I’ve heard that before with other people. And I feel bad for that, that middle manager because I’m like, Well, what are they doing that, that you don’t want to work with them? You know, I want to help I want to figure it out. And just, you know, I always want everybody to get along. Maybe that’s a bad trait of my account management! 

Kelly 

I think that’s a good thing. So, let’s kind of diverge a little bit and talk about how did you get noticed as a middle manager? Do you have any advice for other people about how they can get noticed?

Carli

Yeah, yeah. And I tell a lot of my employees this one when I used to work with them, and I even tell a lot of my mentees is I want them to be seen and be heard. And it doesn’t have to be as an industry leader or a thought expert, it’s I want people to see your personality. And I want you to shine first. But then with that, I want you to show what you’ve done what you’re knowledgeable about, or something fun to share. So, we, as an agency I worked at before, we would do weekly staff meetings, where we do knowledge sharing meetings, and I would always try to encourage people I work with to get out in front of that staff. So, if you did a case study of a digital campaign, and it performed really well, I’m going to tell you, you’re gonna have to go up there and present it, it’s very uncomfortable, I remember hating to have to do it, but you get seen you people see your face, they hear your voice, they hear how you speak. And its good practice for you, as middle management to be put in those uncomfortable situations. And realize, oh, it’s not that bad, or I need practice. So, I’m going to keep getting out in front of this, the staff. So, I always say that is a good way to get noticed and heard. And then you know, hand in hand that wanting to do continuing education and wanting to learn more about your industry is great, you’re gonna want to volunteer to do that, because then people are gonna see oh, this person’s interested in continuing which is going to be a value to my clients and value that the agency, but then you take that back all that knowledge back to your agency, or to your clients and say, hey, I want you to this, this really cool webinar, and I’m going to share some things I learned with you. So now you’re not thought of and seen as a thought expert and somebody who’s hungry for more education, and knowledge. I like that. And then something a little bit more fun. That I was always big into when I was in my 20s and 30s was trying to gather everybody together for happy hours. They do a volleyball team at the agencies to work at, I did a kickball team on set it at a different place. That really fosters personal relationship outside of work. But then inside to it’s nice to know your co-workers at a different level, even if you don’t work with them on the same client or same project. You just know you work with like-minded people who are fun and cool. And it’s something else for you to look forward to outside of work. But being up and telling people, Hey, I’m starting this, this league you should join is another way to kind of get seen and the agency or your corporation to take note that, hey, this person is interested and being proactive and building relationships and client or what is it called? Building employee morale is what I’m kind of trying to say. It’s like they’re doing the work for the agency. 

Kelly 

That’s absolutely essential. And that kind of leads me to another thought about, filling the hole, there’s a lot of places that you might find where there’s a hole within an agency or in a marketing firm. And how can you fill that hole? So, I’ll give an example. One of the agencies I worked with early on the head of the media director left, and there was she was the only media director in the agency. And so, I said, I would step in and take that role, because I trained as an assistant media planner early on in my career. So, I knew some of that, and then helped find and train a new media director for the agency. Well, because I held that role for six or nine months and that transition, and I volunteered to do that, then I was able to get a raise and an increase. So, making sure that you’re looking and seeing where the holes are. Are there ways that you can fill whether you know it or not, even if you’re just volunteering to kind of be a band aid until that problem is solved is it is a great way to get noticed by senior management and totally and demonstrate initiative.

Carli

That’s a great example. 

Kelly 

There’s a book that I read called Never Split the Difference by a former FBI negotiator called Chris Voss. And he has a recent quote, a video on Instagram, where he talked about one of his friends from high school was giving advice about when you’re being interviewed to take a position and the types of roles that you want to take on and he says that he always requests when he’s interviewing, he says exactly this, “I want to be guaranteed to work on projects that are critical to the future of this company”. So, if you’re starting with that you have when you’re interviewing or when you’re speaking to senior management, you are not going to climb the ladder unless you are doing things that are hitting the bottom line. And so, you have to consistently exceed performance expectations and deliver tangible results. And that may be everything from, you know, being a more efficient team in terms of how you’re handling your hours or more efficiently bringing in some software, for example, increasing revenue, implementing cost saving measures, you know, when your work directly contributes to the organization’s success, it’s going to get noticed. But that means that you have to take initiative, and you have to be brave in order to do that, right. And just like you talked about speaking up, yeah, well, you have to be able to take those you don’t wait for instructions. And I think I do what I do see a lot of times now, in lower management, and sometimes even in middle management, is there waiting for me to tell them what to do? Right? I never waited for people to tell me what to do. I just did what I thought needed to be done, it may have been found obnoxious at the time. If something needs to be done, and you’ve identified a problem, and you have a potential solution, take the initiative, here’s the problem, here’s the solution, here’s what we should do. And it’s proactive. And then you will be recognized. But that requires a certain amount of strategic thinking, right, and knowledge about where the organization is headed. And so. making sure that your departmental goals are aligned over with overarching company’s strategic goals is an essential part of that, and understanding the big picture, and making sure that your tasks and your KPIs are all lined up. So those KPIs so here’s a book that I love, for example, Measure What Matters about OKRs. And so, there’s, there’s all sorts of books out there about objectives and key results and how you can make your OKRs lead up into the KPIs for the company within your department. And so, everything that you’re doing is locked, locked in lockstep with the organization as a whole. And that will demonstrate your strategic thinking it will demonstrate your ability to analyze data and trends and market challenges and anticipate changes and opportunities and be proactive with regards to planning and resource out of the app, that sort of thing.

Carli

And even impress leadership at your organization. Because when they hear you saying those words, and speaking like you are a leader, too, they’ll be like, Oh, my gosh, you know, this person, we’re going to invest in them, they’re going somewhere in this organization, I want to keep them. So that’s definitely good way to get noticed. And shoot. Oh, one thing that I wanted to add to that, that I would give a little tip is, I used to do this, I would go out to lunch with the CEO once in a while, we’ll have it on. He was so uncomfortable. But I was like, you know, I don’t care. I’m gonna do it. One day, I was feeling bold. And I was like, We got to lunch. And I asked those questions, and I wanted to hear from him. What does he see for the future of the agency? And where does he want to go? Because when you hear it from his mouth, I was like, okay, that’s what I’m going to help make sure that I’m a part of, and focus on so that every all the leaders know that that’s what I want to do. So, I would encourage anybody, you know, a supervisor, or VP or middle management, go to a supervisor or a VP, or C suite, if you feel comfortable. Say let’s go out to lunch, I want to hear about your goals for the aid for the organization, and where maybe I could help.

Kelly 

I love that. And a lot of people don’t have the guts to do it. You also have to be careful, because you don’t want to be seen as you know, reaching over your supervisor, right. So, there’s politics involved in some of that. But at least to the senior people don’t necessarily get asked by people for middleman, management to go to lunch, for example. So, I would imagine that that would be a positive thing that’s related a lot to this idea of mentorship and sponsorship. Do you want to talk a little bit about that?

Carli

Yes, yes. And I love I love mentoring other people within my organization just because it’s so fun, and I was where they were at this time. But having maybe a mentorship program within your organization if you don’t already start one. Yeah, said startup something if you want to take initiative and be seen, but being able to share someone’s experience or listen about someone’s experience in the agency can definitely help be seen as somebody who is again, proactive, wanting to work their way up invested in your organization. Because I know I had a mentor that I think I had asked for one or may have been assigned, but I kept up with it. And that’s the other thing too. If you’re middle management, you get assigned a senior mentor or you ask for one keep up with it. It is your responsibility as the middle manager to keep that mentor mentee relationship going. Because then again, it shows you are reliable, you’re determined. And I know that that senior mentor that I met with a lot would report back on my conversations to my supervisor And then leadership. So, again, it’s you’re being seen in a good light when you keep up and you’re proactive and you’re taking initiative. So, I definitely think having a mentor mentee is helpful. So, either way, if you are working with somebody above you, or a direct report or somebody younger,

Kelly 

That can also include networking to right making sure that not just within the organization, but outside of the organization that can help you as well. 

Carli

It could be past coworkers, or a coworker who maybe work went to a different organization. And I would say, Hey, can I come to your office, I want to see what it’s about, show me around, not that you’re looking for another job. But you I want to see what’s happening over there. And then, you know, you meet somebody else, and you become friends, or you’re, you’re known, and you’re seen, X actually asked me to…

Kelly 

I’d say that’s the key is visibility. Recognize unless you’re visible. So those ideas that you have about, you know, taking on employee morale, or filling a hole that makes you more visible than you are taking on a high-profile project are things that are going to help you get the recognition that you need, and demonstrate your skills. All right, any other areas of potential tips that we can talk about?

Carli

I would say communication is also strategic communication. That’s huge. Again, talking to new knowing who your audiences. So, if you’re having lunch with the CEO, your conversations gonna be a little different than it would be with a mentor versus up here. So, consider that who you’re speaking with. Yeah. And even written communication, however you are presenting yourself, you are the face of the agency. So, any words that come out of your inbox and into somebody else’s or out of out of your outbox into somebody else’s is representative of who you are and who your agency is. So, you kind of have to think about that. And then another tip that I would have, I guess it’s kind of kind of off topic, but it’s tip for middle management is, if you want to know how you’re performing as a middle manager with your communication or any of the skills, I recommend doing a 360 review. Yeah, because is bold, but it’s also it’s so validating, you know, it’s scary. But it’s like, I want to know how I’m performing. I think maybe I’m a little short on my strategic, my strategy, strategic planning, but I’m great with my tactics. And that was pretty apparent when I got my 360-feedback in. But I would encourage people, if they’re, they want to know what they can improve on, ask their supervisor to send out a 360 review.

Kelly 

Those are a challenge, because sometimes they only come out once a year. So, I prefer to do weekly check ins with my team members and say, you know, how am I doing? How can I improve? How can I help you do your job better? How are you being supported? How do you need more support and ask questions on a regular basis? Absolutely. It’s obvious that you’re, you’re listening. And then not just we have a whole other episode on managing app as well. So, it’s not just underneath managing the people underneath you. It’s also managing up and making sure that you’re confirming that you’re getting what you’re giving what is needed from senior management, because you don’t always know that.

Carli

If and that was something that was written in my one of my 360s, was I needed to work on managing up a little bit. And that was the first time I ever heard of it. And when I was like, well give me an example. And it hit me and I was like, You’re absolutely right. I didn’t realize I should have been approaching it this way. And I did it because I thought it was a personality. I don’t want to overstep, but hearing that feedback was, you know what good then I know, and I’m gonna go ahead and fix that. And I did. But yeah, that’s, that’s it’s interesting. It really is. And even, you know, one thing too, when we’re talking about managing down, I would just, I encourage a lot of people to who I’ve worked with is you’re not too above doing spreadsheets. Yeah. Even as like a BP when I was a VP, I would see my supervisor still stepping in taking one for the team, doing status reports, doing the billing, and it’s just because it’s like we’re a well-oiled machine. We are team we can help each other out. We got each other’s backs, but I’m still not I’m not above doing junior level work if I have to, for lack of a better word, because it’s like, you got to do the work and be humble. Just do a good job be a team player. So that’s something that liked it. help people to as they progress in their career, remember your beginnings and where you came from.

Kelly 

I love that. And I always say it’s, you know, we’re backing each other up account, people especially need to back each other up, and everyone needs to be able to assist if someone’s out, or if someone’s not around or someone’s not. Out 100% There’s gotta be some that can that can support in and middle management should be able to do that without having an attitude about it.

Carli

Yeah. And it’s kind of like a leadership one on one kind of thing, too. It’s, you know, be a good leader be a good person.

Kelly 

And then, so that’s also kind of leading to the idea of fostering a positive work environment, right? And you want to make sure that you’re, you know, recognizing employees’ efforts, and you talked about, you know, giving an opportunity for people to stand up and speak and present their work, for example, once in a while in public, which is challenging, but it’s important, not just for you to do it, but to let your team members do it as well, so that they can have a voice

Carli

And then ask, how are they feeling? You know, with the younger generation to learning, okay, it’s, they want to, they want positive reinforcement, of course, you kind of sometimes have to be a little bit careful with critical feedback. But asking a lot of times, like, how are you feeling? Because I did want to make sure that I was checking in with their emotional mental well-being, when it came to workload, are you okay? Do you need a break?

Kelly 

Doing that a lot more post COVID. Because we’re seeing a lot more mental health issues and people needing to take time. And it’s also a matter of always remind people, if you can take five minutes, after every hour of work, take a five minute break, even for myself, because especially getting outside at least once a day, go walk the dog, if you’re working from home, take a walk around the block, go listen to some music, you know, do a quick yoga break, because mental health is extremely important, and you can’t do your own, do your work unless you have that positive mental state to be able to do it. And so, fostering that positive work environment and demonstrating that as a middle manager, and especially as a mom, right? And you know, modeling that, yes, I’m a mom, and my kids are my, my priority. And so, I’m gonna, that’s, that’s that time where I have to go and stop and get my kid at the bus, right? Or I need to stop work because my kid has, you know, a sports contest, et cetera, et cetera. And I think showing that mom or dad, that that’s a priority, and that family is very important to show that we are a balanced work environment. And we want people who are balanced working in this organization. 

Carli

It’s huge. It’s huge for leaders to exhibit that.

Kelly 

So, any books that you recommend or media resources on tips for middle management?

Carli

Yeah, I wouldn’t even when I was at my middle management from a book that I love that I know, it’s more geared towards females, but it was Lean In by Sheryl Sandberg. And it just happened to so be at the time that I had just given birth to my son. So, I was feeling very driven to be a great career mom, and I was going to kick ass and everything. So that one I really enjoyed I mean, men of course can also get a lot of good information out of it and the struggles that she that she had and leadership. But that is a good book. And then generally, I like to listen to a lot of podcasts or audiobooks about basic operations. So, for instance, I remember, download an audio book a long time ago, it was like economics 101. You know, I haven’t been in college in a long time. So, I needed a refresher, just because I wanted to make sure I was up to speed with. Alright, how are the operations of the business? Or how should I be thinking about it? Should we think about it differently? I would sit in on some finance meetings at the agency to that something different, but what else did I do? Oh, basic finance from for managers. I got a book lot that and it’s just to kind of look up and again, like a refresher, you know, what are some of the things I need to be thinking about as if I’m operating this agency myself? Because I knew one day, I was gonna go out and do my own thing like I am now. But middle managers, I’m telling you now, like, it’s good for you to know all the operations of the business and your client’s business, because that’s what’s going to make you so valuable when you are promoted. And you are senior management and VP and beyond. Absolutely.

Kelly 

And obviously, of course, industry specific stuff, as you mentioned, as well, especially client specific, whether you’re working in healthcare or military veterans or whatever the particular organization or company that you’re working with really understanding those industries and demonstrating your knowledge in those industries is,

Carli

Yes, really important. 

Kelly 

To recap, middle management is tough. It’s a place where you and I both had challenging times and a lot of people do have challenging times and there are ways to get yourself out but it does take some working smart and being strategic and developing, you know, a professional brand that distinguishes you as a valuable asset to your organization and someone who is going to bring new ideas to the table and continuously improve the KPIs of the company and the value of the company and really understands the direction the organization is headed. So, there’s so many opportunities that are out there anything else to add, Carli?

Carli

No, I think this is great. I hope that it’s inspiring and motivating to the listeners. And I can’t wait to hear some other people’s feedback on how they’ve maybe made changes to be seen and be heard, or if they have any questions

Kelly Well, thanks for listening and please share your tips for middle management with us on our social media channels. Thanks, Carli.