The Influence of Middle Management upon Emergent Strategy: a case for more microempirical studies

This empirical study takes a processualist approach (Mintzberg and Waters, 1985; Pettigrew et al., 1992) to investigate the role of middle managers in the strategic change process in a UK NHS trust. The research focuses upon a specific aspect of strategic change, that of the emergence of a marketing ‘strategy’. Such a strategy is seen as an exemplar for other change attempts in the UK NHS. This follows calls for more empirical studies of middle management (Dopson and Stewart, 1990). It also addresses the ‘unjust’ neglect of the public sector by academics carrying out research from a strategic management perspective (Ferlie, 1992; Lyles, 1990). The implications for a future research agenda are drawn out from the present study. These relate to the level of analysis of the strategic change process, conceptual frameworks brought to bear upon analysis, how theory and practice can be brought together and the preferred methodological approach in doing this. While the research site is one drawn from the UK, the analysis may well have resonance in other countries where the health service specifically and the public sector in general have also come under increasing pressure to change.