Being stuck in a lower tier in middle management sucks. You are responsible for the fuckups below as well as the fuckups above, yet you have no authority to really change anything.

Being in middle management in corporate America means that you are given a stick, and told it is a whip. You try to use the stick as if it is a whip, and you get no results. People laugh at you. Your requests roll off of your tongue and onto the floor. The department manager asks you why things haven't been done, but does not allow you the ability to either reward or discipline the people you are in charge of. All this position truly consists of is a little more stress than what you were doing in the first place.

Such a promotion is treated as a reward for a job well done. You are told when you take this position that you will have the opportunity to really turn things around for the department. To be fair, some companies differ from the norm, and actually create these positions in good faith, and allow the employees they place there to actually work productively and help to shape and nurture the department. In the rest, this position is a copout for the big boss. It means that your boss now has a lackey to look like an asshole when he/she wants to lay down the law.

Middle management positions are notoriously the first to be eliminated during a wave of layoffs or a recession.

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