Cascading messages

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Cascading messages

Here’s a bad communication habit I see happening too often in organizations. It destroys trust, increases frustration, and crumbles culture.

When senior leadership shares a change with the organization, be it a new policy, new procedure, or simply a reminder, they often rely on middle management to share the message with their teams, and guess what?

Middle managers deliver the message by throwing leadership under the bus.

We call this triangulation, and it can happen on the individual level, not just the organizational level.

“I don’t like this either,” middle management might tell their teams. Or, “Those shlubs at the top are out of touch,” or “I’m with you guys, but they’re making us do it.”

Middle managers often want to align themselves with their teams, to be liked by the people they manage. They think this behavior bonds them to their teams, but there is an unintended consequence.

What do you think the employees are thinking about their middle manager?

On some level, employees may think that their manager doesn’t have integrity, can’t stand up to leadership and defend them, or that they’re incompetent.

The better approach is to take the time to explain the why, the business reasons, for the change, and to recognize how the change will affect employees.

Senior leaders may need to take the time to help middle managers understand and prepare. Too often, they just throw it over the fence and when messages get mangled, they blame everyone except themselves.

All work has three phases: Ideation, Activation, and Implementation.

The big bosses create the plans, but employees are responsible for ensuring the work is done.

Too often, organizations don’t communicate that middle step: inspiring, explaining the why, and gaining buy-in.

This can’t happen with middle management throwing leadership under the bus.