Stepping into a role as a leader —
whether as a seasoned executive or a neophyte supervisor — is both challenging
and exciting. How you handle this transition can have a huge impact on your
career. You need to hit the ground running not only with your bosses and key
stakeholders but also with your direct reports. Research shows that having
a 90-day plan with 30-day and 60-day milestones
along the way increases your chances of success. But while these plans are
great tools, direct reports will evaluate who you are and what you bring to the
table long before you hit those milestones. Indeed, they’ll make “sticky” evaluations of you from the very first
conversation. That’s why I think you should have a “Day 1” plan, or what I like
to call a “new-leader pitch.”
Just as entrepreneurs need people
and institutions with money to invest in their start-up ideas, leaders and
managers need people with social and human capital to back them. How much support
they get directly influences their effectiveness. The good news is, your
immediate boss is already invested in you (she knows your background and hired
you). But your direct reports haven’t voluntarily made the same “investment” —
at least not yet. And you should never assume that they’ll automatically follow
your lead just because you have the title of manager, vice president, or even
chief fill-in-the-blank (that is, formal power). You must win them over, and you should have a strategy
for doing so that you can translate into a cogent set of talking points that
guide — rather than script — all your early conversations with them. If the
group you manage is large, these discussions will probably begin with an
all-staff meeting at which you introduce yourself, followed by individual
meetings with your reports over the next several days.
What
Should a New-Leader Pitch Include?
To answer this question, I asked
full-time professionals, via an online survey platform, what they would want to learn from
their new leader in their first conversation. In total 278 people responded.
Their average age was 36, and the group was approximately half men (53%) and
half women (47%), made up mostly of college graduates (77%), and represented a
wide range of industries, including telecommunications (14%), government (12%),
health care or pharma (11%), education (11%), finance (10%), and manufacturing
(10%). I purposely made the context a conversation rather than a presentation
to allow respondents to offer what they personally would want to know — rather
than what they think others or their group might want. In my framework, I also incorporate
other research my colleagues and I have conducted over the past decade on work
relationships and new employee onboarding.
The respondents in the survey broke down fairly equally into two
groups: “warriors” and “worriers.” Each group had a
distinct set of concerns. Chances are, you’ll have some of each type among your
reports, so you’ll need to figure out how to address both in your pitch. Let’s
look at what that entails:
Warriors evaluate your knowledge,
competencies, experience (and whether it’s relevant), and leadership approach
to see if they will support you. They want to know if you can handle the job
and understand how to help them do theirs better — or will just get in their
way.
One warrior technical professional
for a large high-tech firm, for instance, said that what he wanted to know from
a new leader was “… have they actually done the job, or do they just think they
know what the job requires. How willing would they be to get in the trenches
and try out our job themselves?” Another warrior who was a nurse said her
biggest concern was whether the new leader “really knows how to do my job. It
is offensive to me that people who don’t know my job try to make judgments.”
Some new leaders might interpret
this line of questioning as an attempt to undermine them, and although that’s
possible, warriors’ general intent is different. Employees’ reactions to a new
leader usually are based on their experience with the most recent leader. While
a warrior direct report might be happy to be rid of a
less-than-stellar leader, he or she may still be rightly on edge about whether
history may repeat itself with you. Indeed, the nurse went on to explain that
“all of this is important, because it has been a problem in the past.”
Warriors also want to know if you
will be an active, hands-on kind of leader. Ultimately, they want you to (as
one professional put it) “jump in and take responsibility to make sure the team
is kept up-to-date, while shielding the staff when there are issues with upper
management.”
Worriers, in contrast, are more
focused on whether you’re a “safe” investment. One sales professional summed it
up well when he said he wants a new leader to “make us feel secure in our jobs
and in the company.” How can you set these reports at ease? Many of them ranked
“clarifying job expectations” as the primary task of new leaders. Deep
curiosity about the leaders’ plans for the future and next steps was also
common (particularly in turnaround situations). “I would like to know if they
plan to make any changes, especially what changes would affect me,” said one
worrier. Last, the worriers also wanted insight into the new boss’s leadership
approach, but their concerns were slightly different from warriors.’ They
wanted answers to questions like: What is her supervising style? Does she have
an open-door policy? How does she want us to approach her with problems?
To address both groups, make sure
your pitch provides information on competence and change,
experience and expectations, and your overall leadership
approach. Jonathan (a pseudonym), a global product development associate at a
pharmaceutical company based in the Caribbean, described how a recently hired
leader did all this in an initial conversation: “The new leader reviewed his
past accomplishments in significant detail. It was impressive. He laid out his
approach to learning the priorities of the various departments. He also told me
that although he would restructure the organization to support the business,
jobs and opportunities would expand. No one would be fired, but everyone would
need to interview again for positions. That first meeting left quite an
impression, and I was excited to see what was to come.” Although it’s true that
the prospect of interviewing for positions might have alarmed some worriers,
setting clear expectations settled the future for them.
Don’ts
but Dos
The survey respondents also pointed
out ways that new leaders can get off on the wrong foot — and what they should
be doing instead.
1. Don’t overshare, but do relate to
reports on a personal level.
Relationships with supervisors can
be powerful motivators. Research shows that when a direct report has a strong
connection with a leader, the report is more likely to identify with the organization, engage in creative behavior, and help others at work. As one professional
said, a good connection with the boss “helps with morale and teamwork.”
Interestingly, another respondent,
an IT consultant, provided nuanced guidance on how to create a productive connection.
New leaders, he said, should “tell me a small bit about their personal life;
nothing too revealing, but enough to make them feel like an actual person.” In
short, do not get overly personal. Another professional went a bit further: “I
would like to know them more, not just about where they worked…. If they could
do anything in life besides what they are doing now, what would that be?”
Others said that sharing personal details helps a new leader be “more
relatable” and “to bond.” It also may help lay the groundwork for later
presenting your vision for change and continuity. And while it may seem as if
relaying that vision right away will help you get your reports excited about
you, you may not want to rush in. One professional underlined a preference for
the new leader to wait to “give the vision for the department once they know
us, the staff, better.”
2. Don’t just share your résumé,
but do tell them your “story.”
While warriors may be examining your
experience and worriers may be wondering how it influences your approach to
them, both groups want to know about your work history. However, they both want
you to stake your claim as the new leader through your career “story,”
or narrative. They want to know, for instance,
why this particular job makes sense for you at this time. As one warrior said,
“I would like to know what led my supervisor to get into a role like this. We
help hospices manage their patient care, and our company is only medium-sized
and not wealthy. It takes a certain kind of person to give up money and work
for a good cause.”
Jonathan’s boss was able to provide
a powerful and personalized career narrative. As Jonathan recalled, “The new
leader expressed his excitement with being here. He took the opportunity to
share a bit about himself. He highlighted that his previous college athlete
days provided him valuable lessons for his career and his daily drive. He
related past successes in a similar role that he thought would translate to our
organization.”
In your narrative, you can and
should project your story into the future. Indeed, several respondents wanted
to know about a new leader’s goals for the leadership position itself. A health
care industry professional commented: “I would like to know what their vision
for the position entails and how this vision affects me personally.” Employees
also appreciate it when you explain why your new position is integral to your
story and, most important, how your direct reports play a critical role in that
story.
After all, everybody likes to be
part of a story — especially a success story. And if, as a new leader, you put
some thought into how to make a good first impression on your reports and win
their support, you can help them be part of yours.
Sourcce:
HBR Apr 16, 2020
