Middle managers in Scotland’s social services: A scoping analysis for the Scottish Social Services Council by University of Stirling

Abstract

In this report we start by setting the context for our scoping analysis of the role and functions of middle managers in Scotland's social services. Within this section, we discuss the challenge of identifying ‘who is a middle manager' and whether the term means the same thing across the statutory, independent and third sectors. We draw on existing research into middle management to identify key issues and to ground the work within literature that includes, but is broader than public services, and we consider the relevance as well as the limitations, of these studies for contemporary social services.