You’ve met with your team and completed your evaluation. You have most likely started to formulate some plans of attack, including a leadership plan for the next 90 days. At this point, you must recognize four facts about yourself to ensure a successful path forward:
- Management is about getting things done through other people
- You need your employees more than they need you
- You’re paid for what your employees do, not what you do
- Success only comes when your employees succeed
Accomplishing More Through Others
You need to get good at getting lots accomplished through others. You should be asking what needs to be done. If you don’t know (which you should by now), your team should be letting you know what must be done. You will need to identify the tasks everyone is best at and precisely what you’re great at, concentrating on one of the time and checking them off. After the tasks are completed, you will need to reset priorities based on new realities.
From a decision-making perspective, you will need to ask what’s right for the business. It’s about having win/win scenarios as much as possible for your team, colleagues, and the company. Decisions that are right for the organization are ultimately right for all stakeholders. You should devise an action plan specifying that everyone can achieve consistency with the right amount of effort, not overburden anyone. Your plans should include checking in at points throughout to account for issues that pop up and make changes if new opportunities arise.
Taking Responsibility
As plans started to come together, you will need to own and take responsibility for decisions, good or bad. If things go awry, own it. If things work out, accept the victory, but don’t gloat. Ensure that each decision specifies who is accountable for carrying it out, when it must be completed, who will be affected by it, and who must be informed. Regularly review decisions, especially new hires and promotions. Did they work as expected? If not, why? You need to be continually learning and course-correcting. This enables you to alter poor decisions before doing real damage long-term.
Take responsibility for communication. Get input from superiors, subordinates, etc., on your initial action plans. You’re still early in your new role, so you may not have built up enough trust to be genuinely autonomous. Let each person know what information will need to get the job done. Pay equal attention to your peers’ and superiors’ information needs or requests. They can provide you with different things to consider that you haven’t thought of yet, helping to ensure you don’t stumble out of the gate.
Focus On Opportunities, Not Problems
You will be more positive when you build up a track record of exploiting opportunities instead of just solving problems. Even though there may (and often will be problems), thinking and speaking of them as opportunities will go a long way to establish yourself as innovative and good at driving change. Asking yourself and others about how you can exploit opportunities that manifest both inside and outside your organization to everyone’s mutual benefit will give you a reputation for being forward-thinking. Then comes the responsibility to match your best people with the best opportunities.
Effective Communication
You should also start to be seen as capable of running productive meetings that people want to attend. Articulate each meeting’s purpose from the onset and again at the end of the session once the goal is accomplished. Follow up with a short communication summarizing the discussion, spelling of new work assignments, action items, and deadlines for completing them. Make sure the meeting is interactive, too, so it’s not just you that speaks.
Be seen and heard as a person saying, “We,” not “I.” Your authority comes from the organization’s trust in you. To get the best results, always considering the organization’s needs and opportunities before your own. You need to bring out the best in everyone you lead. Remember, it’s not about you. We win, lose, and work together.
90 Days In
If your 90 days in and effectively delivering in the areas mentioned above of management, you’re evolving your style as you should. You’re no longer crawling along your journey, beginning to walk on your own, and show more of what you’re capable of. Let’s keep up the momentum and start running faster. It’s time to take your approach up a notch.
