The statistics on strategy execution are dismal:

59% of middle managers fail at resolving conflicts in corporate strategy.
45% of middle managers cannot name one of the top five corporate goals.
64% of cross department/functional issues are poorly resolved.

And maybe as you could expect from this:

53% of companies cannot react timely to new opportunities.

You do not need to be a rocket scientist to know that this trajectory is not going to launch most companies’ latest strategic plans successfully. In fact, these data might make you feel that middle management would be better suited as test dummies for the next generation of manned space-vehicle. Granted, the data show there is a dearth of leadership in middle management, but executive tier has a culpable hand.