J
ÖNKÖPING
I
NTERNATIONAL
B
USINESS
S
CHOOL
JÖNKÖPING UNIVERSITY
“The Art of good Businessis being a goodMiddle Man”
ager
…In Growth Companies
Master’ thesis within Business AdministrationAuthors: Hanna LundquistIngrid PeterssonTutors: Helén AnderssonRhona JohnsenJönköping June, 2007
i
Acknowledgements
First of all, we would like to thank our tutors, Helén Andersson and Rhona Johnsen, fortheir supervision and support during the writing process of this thesis.Secondly, we want to thank Tomas Müllern for letting us participate in his research projectregarding middle managers in change.In addition, we want to express our gratitude to the participating middle managers, at therespective companies mentioned below, for contributing with their valuable insights thathave led to the fulfilment of this thesis.FFaaggeerrhhuulltt SSccaannddiinnaavviiaannPPhhoottoo HHooggiiaaBBuussiinneessssSSooffttwwaarree IIssaabbeerrggRRaappiidd
Jönköping, June 6
th
2007
Hanna Lundquist Ingrid Petersson
ii
Master’s Thesis in Business Administration
Title: “The Art of good Business is being a good middle man”ager…in growth companiesAuthors: Hanna Lundquist and Ingrid PeterssonTutors: Helén Andersson and Rhona JohnsenDate: 2007-06-14Subject terms: Corporate Growth, Middle management, Leadership, Motiva-tion, Communication, and Organizational change
Abstract
The existing literature dealing with corporate growth in relation to lower level managementis limited; instead the main focus in the past has been put on the top management perspec-tive. Therefore, the aim of this thesis is to investigate and describe middle management infour growth companies. Middle management can be defined in many different ways, andthe definition that has been applied in this thesis is;
middle managers are working below the CEO and have a managing and/or leading position including responsibility for lower level managers and/or em- ployees.
From the theoretical section we have created a model that connects the theories about cor-porate growth and middle management. Corporate growth includes growth strategies andgrowth influencers, whereas middle management discuss the managerial roles, leadership inconnection to growth and modern leadership in connection to organizational structure, aswell as communication, motivation, and organizational change.Regarding the method used to fulfil the purpose of our thesis, we decided to conduct aqualitative study with face-to-face semi-structured interviews with ten middle managers atfour companies. Our scientific approach is thus interpretive and our research approach isabductive. The selected companies have experienced
an increase in the number of employees and turnover per year during five to ten years.
Finally, our findings resulted in a thorough description of the perceived growth strategiesused at the respective companies resulting from the perceptions of the middle managers. Inaddition, we confirmed that most challenges in relation to growth that middle managersencountered are related to restructurings, changes in culture, uncertainty among employees,pressure to achieve profitable growth, as well as how to attract competent and highly edu-cated employees.Moreover, in regards to the leadership styles practiced among middle managers, the mod-ern features seemed to dominate at all the investigated companies, and these could in somecases also be connected to a loose, idea based organization. Lastly, we believe that the mid-dle managers in our study have the possibility to influence growth either directly or indi-rectly depending on their positions. Directly through participating in the executive groupfor example, and indirectly though motivating and engaging the lower level managers to beinnovative and reach the set out growth goals of the organization.
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