PalavraS-chave: administração pública; liderança; competências do gestor público; gestão por resultados.

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This study conducts an analysis of influential aspects to the development of vertical relationships on the Brazilian steel industry that uses wood charcoal as raw material. It shows that pig iron producers tend to realize more partnerships and vertical integration processes along the value chain, and that these changes should improve the competitiveness and environmental performance of the overall sector. The results indicate that these strategies are applied by pig iron producers as an attempt to reduce uncertainties, comply with institutional rules, obtain efficiency gains and act on more stable, profitable and differentiated markets. Nevertheless, the development of these vertical relationships depends on specific management practices. For example, the upstream vertical integration to wood charcoal production activities is correlated to a lot of economies of scale, found on the silviculture or carbonization processes. The progress of Brazilian small charcoal producers is also reliant on intersectoral partnerships, involving companies, nonprofit organizations, communities, government agencies, among others. Considering the downstream vertical integration to steel and foundry activities, it is remarkable that this strategy goes throw the development of competences related to commercial abilities and superior technical quality on the production. It is important to highlight that this dissertation presents an advanced level of analysis comparing to the majority of studies about the topic, because it adopts a sectoral approach and pursuit elements of different theories. In this sense, the literature review is remarkable in its discussions about production costs, transaction cost economics, resource-based view of the firm, strategic choice and institutional theory. In methodological terms, the research follows a qualitative approach, has exploratory purposes and adopts the multiple case study strategy. The data analysis consisted specially on semi-structured interviews conducted with twenty seven executives of fifteen different organizations. All interviews were recorded, transcribed, and for the treatment of the data the content analysis technique was adopted, using for it the NVivo 8 software. The research also points out to strategic opportunities of the industry companies from three possibilities of vertical relationships along the value chain: (i) downstream vertical integration of pig iron producers to the automotive parts industry; (ii) formation of industrial condominiums to the steel production, and (iii) intensification of pig iron producer's partnerships and industrial conglomerates.

Resumo Embora exista uma crescente literatura que destaca o papel de indivíduos da média gerência na estratégia, já se passaram cerca de 10 anos desde que ela foi revisada. Este artigo tem o objetivo de analisar essa literatura e sugerir oportunidades futuras. Para tal, foi conduzida uma revisão narrativa envolvendo 63 trabalhos publicados desde 1970, cada qual classificado de acordo com as suas questões de pesquisa, principais variáveis e correntes teóricas. Tais informações foram a base para uma análise de conteúdo por meio da qual foi possível identificar uma nova tipologia com seis categorias centrais de estudos. As categorias descrevem diferentes tipos de envolvimento da média gerência na estratégia, indicando maior diversidade de possíveis caminhos teóricos, metodológicos e contextuais sobre o tema.

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Objective: The purpose of our study was to investigate how the relationship between top and middle management occurs during a strategy implementation in a crisis context, more specifically the one triggered by Covid-19 virus. Methodology/approach: The approach used was a single, in-depth case study. We adopted a process perspective, which considers the sequence of events and choices made over time, at multiple levels and units of analysis. We analyzed documents and interviewed members of top management, middle management, operational management and two consultants working in the investigated company. We then seek to identify instances of action and interaction where patterns could emerge. Originality/Relevance: There is an increasing number of studies about the role of middle management in the organizations strategic process, but there are still few empirical studies in crisis contexts. This study investigates strategic implementation process during the Covid-19 crisis, shedding light on dynamics of control, relationship and autonomy involving top and middle levels of management. Main results: We identified that the Covid-19 crisis enabled the closer approximation of top management with the middle managers, intensified by Crisis Committee meetings in the organization. The crisis management also catalyzed the process of reducing ambiguities and opening up senior management for the presentation and acceptance of ideas from the middle echelons.Theoretical/methodological contributions: Our findings contribute to the literature on crises, revealing both the process of strengthening relationships between top and middle managers, as well as the building content from the contributions of the middle managers, which can lead to a superior result. We also endorse the impacts of the facilitating conditions proposed by Mantere (2008) based on the work of Floyd Wooldridge (1992), even in the context of crisis. We also endorsed the proposals by Macpherson, Breslin and Akinci (2021) on the role of middle managers as connectors for initiatives in extreme situations that, otherwise, would not have visibility. Social contributions / for practice: For practice, we launch additional clues in favor of greater openness of top managers for the participation of middle managers in the implementation and strategic adaptation, even in a context of crisis. Similarly, we demonstrated that extreme crisis contexts are prone to rethink interorganizational structures and relationships, aiming at the renewal of management strategies and roles.