Please don’t think this is a derogatory statement about managers because it isn’t.

Having spent more than 30 years in business, I have built up an enormous respect for the important work managers do in the corporate world.

However, managers are often viewed from above and below as a collective layered population that exist largely to maintain control and ensure respective, operational delivery.

By using the Permafrost metaphor, we can see how managers have sometimes inadvertently found themselves likened to a thick subsurface layer of the business that can unwittingly enable or prevent the flow of communications that pass through their command. 

Commands that were originally designed by Senior Leaders or the Executive to permeate, and drive performance through change to the end users.

If I have learned anything about human behaviour in business, it’s this;

People don’t usually do things because they are Stupid, it’s because they are Smart…



It is often the culture, systems or processes that are Stupid.

Therefore, the Smart managers work this to their advantage and as an unintended consequence, instead of implementing the constant series of desired changes, end up maintaining the status quo, creating a type of permafrost barrier amongst the chain of command.

So, What's The Solution?

Empowering your middle management through consistent engagement with the corporate WHY and regular designated personal contribution to forming the HOW and WHAT.

As the saying goes;

"What people help build, they will not destroy!"

When most people hear the words Cultural Transformation, they immediately think of an insurmountable challenge over many years that they would rather not have to endure.

The reality is nearly always quite different. Most of the time Cultures just need a bit of a massage around the middle manager region… desolving that subsurface layer of permafrost.

Are you ready to transform the Culture of your organisation? Click the links below to learn more.