The experiences of middle managers enacting strategic roles in financial services organisations in South Africa

Abstract

For organisations to remain competitive in uncertain turbulent markets, growing research on emergent strategic approached calls for business leaders to open up strategy formulations processes and include actors outside the corporate elites, such as middle managers, in so called open strategy processes (Brielmaier & Friesl, 2023). This to afford them the unique insights and perspectives to guide strategy formulation for strategic agility. However, there is limited knowledge about the practical applications of such approaches beyond theory (Brielmaier & Friesl, 2023), and less about the middle managers perspectives when invited to join open strategy processes notwithstanding the dynamics of their interactions with senior leadership (Rouleau & Balogun, 2011; Splitter et al., 2023) This cross-sectional interpretivist study employs exploratory qualitative research methods to explore the experiences of middle managers in organisation’s strategy formulation processes. Data was gathered from 14 semis-structured interviews with middle managers from the financial services sector in South Africa and thematically analysed to gain their unique lived experiences. Findings indicated that the majority of middle managers were being included in strategy formulation with positive experiences of inclusion, however a new perspective were the negative consequences of inclusion that impaired their ability to effectively participate. These findings have important significant for business leaders adopting open strategy process as they provide pertinent insights that can guide the preparation of middle managers for inclusion in strategy formulation. In addition, this research addresses the call for research that gives light on the dynamic of interdiscursive interactions between senior leaders and middle managers from the middle managers unique perspective.