It’s a common joke, especially related to software design & development projects, to blame resistance to change and progress on “the frozen middle”… those pesky (or worse) middle managers, who screw everything up, and/or hold everything up!

The idea, of course, is that CEOs and maybe CIOs really want the change quickly, whatever that may be… and of course (typically) the software design and development teams want to go faster and cut through bureaucracy, etc… but it’s those (useless?) Middle Managers who keep slowing things down.

So is it all about you, and your leadership style, or is it about them, and their stubbornness? Can you change them? Can you change yourself? Is it possible it’s not all about you, or maybe it is all about you… or maybe there’s a 3rd way you haven’t be able to see yet?