new leadership role? 6 rules for effective new leaders in first 90 days
DESCRIPTION
Career coach Jean Erickson Walker offers 6 tips to help you be effective in the first 90 days of your new leadership role.TRANSCRIPT
Jean Erickson Walker, Ed.D., [email protected]
503-816-5956
New Leadership Role?Six Rules to Ensure Your Success
Rule 1: Remember, You Have Only One Chance to Make a Good First Impression
“What we call the beginning is often the end.”
Thomas Stearns Elliot
Why Leaders Fail
“When achieving results becomes more important than the means to their achievement – that is the moment when a leader steps onto the slippery slope of failure.
Often such leaders see their followers as pawns, a mere means to an end, thus confusing manipulation with leadership.”
Why Leaders Fail, Mark Sanborn
Critical Questions
“What’s In it For Me?”
“Do you mean me any harm?”
Everyone is listening to radio station “WIFM”
How do you take people from where they are now… To where they need to be?
Create climate of trust Role model behavior you want to see in others Ask questions rather than make pronouncements Communicate vision of positive growth & learning
Rule 2: Be a Good Guest
1. Be visible
2. Listen well, be respectful
3. Be appreciative
4. Honor the traditions and decisions of the past
5. Don’t compare to your last company: People, Culture, Company, or Processes
It’s All in the Perspective…Are You There for the Long Run?
Your Job is to Create Stars…NOT be OneThere’s only room for one star…
if you insist on it being you, no one else will be.
Long Distance Runner
Sprinter
Collaborator
Coach
Lone Ranger
Star
Rule 3: Get to Know the Territory
Do your research!
Read the resumes of your direct reports; check out
colleagues on LinkedIn, know their backgrounds Learn the products Meet the customers Delve deeply into the financials Become a student of the organization Find out who holds the informal power Recruit mentors Assume the best
Identify the Challenge
Steady as she goes? Refine, smooth out the rough edges
and polish?
Take it to the next level? Turnaround?Are you Solving the Right Issues? Or Swimming Against the Current?
Rule 4: Build Bridges, Not Barriers
Leave your donks home Focus on the whole 360 team Lead the way across the barriers Make no major decisions in the
first 90 days; make no promises Take care of your people
Applaud More; Bow Less.
Balance of Power
Your Role is to Ensure the Balance
Mission
TeamCustomers
Organization
Releasing the Power
“One cannot speak of leaders who cause organizations to achieve superlative performance, for no one can cause it to happen.
Leaders can only recognize and modify conditions which prevent it; perceive and articulate a sense of community, a vision of the future, a body of principle to which people can become passionately committed, then encourage and enable them to discover and bring forth the extraordinary capabilities that lie trapped in everyone struggling to get out.” The Art of Chaodic Leadership, Dee Hock
Rule 5: Watch Out for the Sharks
Wounded Tigers: Wanted your job and still licking their wounds
Confidants: Alliance builders who want you on their side
Informal Power Centers: Where the real decisions are made
Buried Bones: Ready to rise up, ghosts at the party
Thought Leaders: Influencers others follow: Up the mountain or over the cliff
Hidden Values: Cultural expectations everyone knows but no one talks
about
Rule 6: Recognize Your Role as Change Agent
Honor the Past, Respect the Present &Visualize the Future
Direct the Communication Demonstrate Commitment to Organization Create Small Group Discussion Opportunities No Altar Sacrifices! Recognize Individual Differences Get Out of the Clouds
LISTEN!!
Reactions to Change
Inevitable pain or opportunity? Natural result of evolution? Disrupts the status quo? Requires time for acceptance? Get it over with so we can get back to normal? Can and should be managed? Must be controlled and suppressed? Provides opportunity for individual advancement? Creates problems; displaces experienced people?
Bringing It All Together
1. Willingness to Lead
2. Positive Belief in People
3. Skill to Communicate Vision and Purpose
4. Decision-Making Technique that Builds Commitment
5. Leadership Profile that Builds Trust and Confidence
You Are The Catalyst !
“The specific context a leader faces is hard to grasp because it’s like stepping into a river – you can never step into the same place twice because its flow is constantly changing.
Leaders who find comfort and security in stability will have difficulty surviving.”The Leadership Challenge, Gretchen M. Spreitzer, Thomas G. Cummings
The Road Ahead is Up to You…
The impressions and the decisions you make in the first 90 days will determine whether you are there 18 months from now. Build your support by thinking first of others.