Sounds great, right? Well, not if you’re a manager, obviously. But the concept sounds great, right? Less oversight, more trust, more autonomy, we all want that!
What these articles get wrong is this: the idea of managers, especially middle managers, being senseless buffoons or mere pawns with all the authority of a mall cop has gone too far.
The role of a middle manager needs a refresh, not an elimination. Middle managers are the unsung heroes of organizations. However, these managers must be leaders, not just human project management tools.
Do We Need Managers?
Where do we stand with managers today?
The workplace changed a lot during the pandemic. We all came together, huddled from home, turned our kitchen table into a workstation, then our guest room or a corner in our living room into our home office, and overall, stayed productive.
In the end, a lot of us felt we didn’t need a person hovering over our shoulder to keep us on track and working. So, logically, a lot of us felt we didn’t need a manager, and a lot of senior leaders felt we could cut out some middle managers.
A survey by GoodHire in 2022 of workers in a variety of fields including education, finance, health care, marketing, and even science– found that 83% of American workers said they could do their own job without their managers.
But paradoxically, GoodHire also found that 70% of American workers strongly enjoy or somewhat enjoy working for their manager. This finding is backed up by Pew Research, which released data in late 2023 stating that “a majority of workers give their boss high ratings.”
So, people like their bosses but could do without them. What’s really going on here?
Why Do We Hate Managers? (Or Think We Do)
The brainless middle manager trope. It’s an old one.
They’re in our shows, our movies, our social media posts, and, yeah, in our lives, too. They show up late and leave early. They scrutinize everything you do.
Track your tasks. Track your productivity. Track your success. Track your failures.
Middle managers today are basically glorified task managers, and that really must change. But…why are they glorified task managers in the first place?
Gallup just published the results of a massive study on managers. A key finding was that, right now, managers have more work to do, and they are on a tighter budget with new teams. Managers are more likely to be burnt out, disengaged, and looking for a new job.
More Work: Remember the remote and hybrid culture you probably had to facilitate from scratch without experience with video software like Zoom and Webex?
That was a huge undertaking. Managing people’s well-being wasn’t in the managerial job description before. Adding it may be long overdue, but it was still a task that managers felt ill-equipped to take on officially.
Less Budget: The economy was a roller coaster for all industries over the last 4 years. In response, a lot of budgets were frozen or tightened. Your company was probably hit in negative ways that affected resources that make your role easier.
New teams: There were many quitting, layoffs, hiring, and job hopping. Now, teams are shaken up, gone, or brand new.
As Gallup put it, when all these things compound, it makes sense that middle managers are feeling squeezed.
When you’re burnt out, disengaged, and looking for a new job, you will become a minimum “glorified task manager,” just making sure the wheels are spinning.
A manager should be a leader. Plain and simple.
This isn’t just semantics. A leader is an inspirational figure who facilitates great work. Tools like Jira, Trello, and Asana can keep track of tasks, and you can check them from time to time.
But it shouldn’t be the first thing a manager does: check the management software. Instead, check on the people!
What About Managerless Companies?
It’s worth stating here that none of this is new. The discussion about whether managers make a difference has been going on for a while, with both sides citing examples to suit their opinions.
On the managerless company side, Washington-based Valve Software gets cited often. If you’ve ever played some of their most critically acclaimed video games, like Half-Life and Portal, you’ve probably heard of them.
They also created the Steam platform, which, again, if you’re a gamer, you know well. Valve was started by two former Microsoft employees in the early 1990s and began, from the start, as a flat company.
No managers beyond the executive c-suite level. People decided what to work on and what to prioritize, and the company became a huge success. By a lot of metrics, it’s been a success. They are a little late on deadlines for game releases, but because they are so good, they’re often forgiven.
But here’s where it fell short.
Priority is only given to what the majority of the organization prioritizes. At Valve, it was the product, the critically acclaimed games, and the Steam platform. What wasn’t prioritized? Diversity. The demographics are predominantly white and male for a tech company, even for a gaming company. This discrepancy came to a boiling point in 2020 when the executive leaders were blindsided by rising social issues and criticized for their silence both internally and externally.
Other companies like Medium and Zappos rolled back their managerless structures. At Medium, they said the structureless structure impacted the ability to scale and the time-consuming nature of it all. It also negatively affected recruiting.
It all seemed cool but risky. Zappos said it took the attention away from the customer, and customer service was what they were known for.
These aren’t the only organizations to have ever tried managerless organizational designs. There’s a whole organization that catalogs them. In total, about 250 companies use a managerless structure. But most of them have employees under 50. And nearly all of them started as a managerless company—they didn’t just wake up and decide their thousands of employees could suddenly manage themselves.
I should be clear: I’m rooting for those places and others to work. I’m in favor of any organization that helps people do their best work. I just personally believe it’s better to bet on talented people and great teams than on a seemingly perfect organizational design.
Importance of Managers
Managers have a great impact, good and bad.
When you think about who your mentors are or people who have impacted you the most in life outside of your family, I bet you’re thinking of a teacher who inspired you early in your life, maybe your first basketball coach, or some other authority figure that took the time to understand you and teach you some valuable skills.
In other words, you think of a manager.
In organizations, managers make up about 70% of the variance in team engagement. They have a tremendous impact on whether companies succeed or fail. 82% of American workers said they would potentially quit their jobs because of a bad manager. The impact and stakes are REAL.
Like it or not, the work we do in our lives defines a big chunk of who we are, and managers really hold the power to make our work fulfilling or a mindless grind. Right now, things are bleak. The more work, less budget, and brand-new teams, the burnout.
The ripple effects that come from the manager level go so far and so wide. But there is a way to help them.
Employees need more training and paths upward.
The ‘Good’ Managers
People who are promoted to managers are often promoted because they are really good at their skill set as individual contributors, and the only way to climb the corporate ladder is to get promoted and manage people.
The hard truth here is that not everyone is cut out to be a manager; not everyone even wants to be a manager.
Gallup found that only 48% of managers strongly agree that they currently have the skills needed to be exceptional at their jobs. Only three in 10 hybrid managers have received any formal training on leading hybrid teams.
Authors and McKinsey consultants Bill Schaninger, Bryan Hancock, and Emily Field have an interesting thought about this in their newest book.
Instead of promoting someone who is really good at their craft to a management role, there should be master tracks for technical areas. Putting your best technical person in a management role might drain them off that fire that made them so good in the first place.
Moving up in your company should not be tied exclusively to managing people and if you promote people to those roles, you need a plan to train them. In fact, before promoting them, it’s worth creating a trial project they can manage or put them in charge of interns for a summer.
As Bill Schaninger said, “The first time someone does something shouldn’t be after they’ve already gotten the job.”
As a manager, it’s also part of your job (I know, another task, but it’s important) to develop members of your team. Maybe they’ll be managers one day; maybe they’ll even be your manager one day if you train them well enough. Your team is on a path in their career. Their jobs will fluctuate, and people will move on, move up, and change course, so coaching them is crucial. Remember, the impact of a manager on someone’s life can be huge. There’s a lot of influence here.
Managers are not task managers; they are leaders.
Focus On The Team, Not the Individual
Now, if you are a manager, you must resist the tendency to micromanage—the feeling of every little task being tracked is what created the motivation to fire managers in the first place. So, focus on the team as a whole, not the individual. Great leadership is about letting the team hold itself accountable.
You need to do your one-on-one meetings to check in with your people and ensure there are no glaring individual performance issues. But great leaders are about teaching the team to hold itself accountable.
Great leaders often come off more as facilitators who are there to guide and support the team as they divvy up tasks and co-create the best strategy.
Even when you’re doing your individual check-ins, I recommend a 10-10-10 format. If you have 30 minutes to check in with each person every other week, then spend only 10 minutes of that time focused on their actual performance as an individual.
Spend the next 10 minutes focused on the team, how the team is supporting them, and how they are contributing to the team. Then, spend the final 10 minutes on how you’re doing as their manager. Ask where you could improve and what support they need from you.
No one wants a 30-minute discussion around their performance flaws, but most people respond positively when the bulk of the time is spent focused on how their team and their boss can help them.
The Role of Managers in Hybrid Work Environments
Recently, hybrid and remote work has become more normal for organizations. The shift has had a tremendous effect on the role of managers. Once managers were invested in supervising activities in person and face to face, they now have the challenge of building trust while maintaining productivity in the virtual space.
The management process will now focus on the results rather than how and when the employee will work, so the expectations and goals will be revamped accordingly.
You have to give employees the autonomy to manage their schedules and make them feel supported and engaged as your regular employees.
You can bridge the physical distance gap using platforms that support online communication, like Zoom, Slack, and Microsoft Teams, but all of these require empathetic leadership. You can schedule casual check-ins to address individual team members or celebrate individual achievements, but give the employees the necessary time and space.
We no longer need to micro-manage the task; instead, we need to work on managing the relationship with the employees, building trust, and giving them an environment where they feel comfortable and empowered.
The Manager’s Role in Organizational Culture
Managers are the key to setting the organization’s culture. Although the senior leaders of a company set the vision, values, and mission for the company, it’s the managers who bring them to life through their actions and interaction with the employees.
The manager’s attitude and communication style create a positive workplace culture.
Why do we need a strong or positive workplace culture? As per a study by Deloitte, organizations with strong cultures are 12 times more likely to achieve superior business performance.
Managers are more than important since they play a great role in creating such a culture. Moreover, the duties of a manager include:
- Encourage employees to have an open communication channel and to ensure psychological safety.
- Recognize and reward behavior rather than efforts that align with the company values and goals.
- Address conflicts quickly and maintain a cohesive workforce
Final Thoughts
So, do we really need managers? Yes, but in a capacity that reflects the evolving needs of modern workplaces. As we look ahead, let’s champion a new breed of leaders—managers who not only oversee projects but also empower people, shape culture, and turn challenges into opportunities for growth.
The debate about whether we need managers is not about questioning their existence but rather about reestablishing their purpose in the workplace.
Today’s managers are no longer supervisors but rather mentors, culture builders, and strategic leaders who will bridge the gap between an organization’s goals and its employees.

About the author
David Burkus is an organizational psychologist, keynote speaker, and bestselling author of five books on leadership and teamwork.