What's the biggest challenge/frustration of middle management?

Answer 1

Attempting to encourage people to higher levels of quality.

Over the years, I would say that there is a 5-10% range of employees that always produce good quality and quantity, and they require minimal supervision.

On the other end of the scale, there are 5-10% of employees that are just biding their time to be fired. That, or they move around a lot from job to job.

In the middle are people who require varying amounts of supervision and guidance.

Answer 2

Finding qualified personnel that can do the job as well as they can.