Power to the Middle

CHAPTER 8 Taking the Lead on Talent Management From Preservers to Challengers of the Status Quo

In our work with organizations, we have seen some healthy and productive interactions between middle managers and human resource departments. Unfortunately, these have been few and far between. Instead, we have seen relationships that are adversarial, suspicious, patronizing, or nearly nonexistent.

It’s common for the managers to blame HR for this state of affairs, and for HR to blame the managers. The truth is, there is fault to be found on both sides, and it largely stems from an ignorance of the new, twenty-first century way in which work must be managed.

To middle managers we say this: Stop expecting HR to perform the talent management role ...