How can you successfully adapt to a new leadership role?

Embrace your vulnerabilities. Don't pretend to know more than you do. Take this as an opportunity to engage with others to learn from them, and fill in your knowledge gaps. This allows others around you to feel empowered. This also lowers the barriers between leaders and those they lead, but showing your team you are human, it's OK to ask questions, you are in this TOGETHER, not apart. Embracing vulnerability is an important approach to building bridges with your team, not walls without them.

In my experience, those initial weeks are best spent listening and learning. Unless it's a crisis situation where managing that crisis is your immediate mandate, resist the urge to take immediate actions. Take the time to appreciate what has been done so far. It's fair to ask questions and be critical, but it's crucial never to be judgmental. Avoid giving the impression that what was done before wasn't good enough. Focus on building bridges rather than burning them.

Listen and observe. Pay attention to the small details and watch for patterns. You can learn a lot in a small time just through that. Look for strengths, weaknesses, roadblocks your team might not be noticing. Write it all down and connect the dates.

To succeed in a new leadership role, build strong relationships, understand the culture, and actively listen. Prioritize effective communication, seek feedback, and set clear expectations. Demonstrate humility, learn from the team, and leverage strengths while addressing development areas. Embrace change, foster collaboration, and invest in ongoing learning. Balancing confidence with adaptability helps navigate challenges and earn trust. Leading by example, in my TA role, I initiated one-on-one meetings, addressing feedback, implementing positive changes, ensuring a smooth transition. This built trust and synergy within the team, fostering a collaborative and effective work environment.

In my experience, when you assume a new leadership role in a new organization, it is important to get to know the environment. About how decisions are made. Get to know, not just your team, your boss, but also your peers. People may approach you with many requests. Give yourself enough time to assess the big picture.

Leadership can often feel like a lonely place, but it doesn't have to be. Find your tribe. Speaking to people at the same stage in their career as you can offer an invaluable support network. Sharing your experience with people aspiring to follow in your footsteps will bring fulfilment in knowledge sharing and finding someone who is more experienced than you will provide a mentor for advice.

It's important to build a network of those you can TRUST, and frankly, those you can't. By nature, I am a trust first person, but it doesn't mean I'm not cautious. Show others that they can trust you, listen with the intent of understanding, not the intent to respond. The more you listen, and the less you respond, is a great way to earn trust. Less is more on the speaking front, especially early on when being a new leader or joining a new organization. You will quickly learn who you can work with, collaborate with, leverage each others skills for mutual benefit. You'll also learn who you should be aware of, not avoid, but have more caution in what words are spoken and/or actions taken in their presence.

It is said that leadership success relies less on skill but on the configuration of your team. In other words, as long as you know what is necessary in the context as strengths, as long as you have some of them and can bring together a team of people who cover your blindspots, you are likely to end up with a great team and a strong internal network.

D'après mon expérience, la création de rites et de rythmes managériaux en phase avec le pas de temps de l'équipe est primordial. Je préconise toujours 4 rituels : 1 - Chaque semaine un entretien individuel de 30mn avec chaque collaborateur pour créer la confiance individuelle. 2 - Chaque semaine une réunion d'équipe de 60mn (90mn pour le top management) avec tous les collaborateurs N et N-1 pour créer la confiance et la dynamique collective. 3 - Chaque mois, une réunion en comité restreint "pilotage" pour vérifier la direction de nos actions. 4 - Chaque trimestre, une réunion d'encadrement élargi pour conformer nos actes avec notre vision d'entreprise.

Networking is important and don't limit this exercise within the Head Office. When I assumed a leadership role in distribution strategy, the first thing I did and I am still now grateful for that is to travel to the provinces where we have the big sales centers. Talk with customers. Talk with sales. Get to know the field.

To a great extent, skills should have been developed before you got into the role. Unless it is an emergent property like a technical skill, do your best to anticipate what the role needs before you get into it. Otherwise, you'd merely be promoted into a level of incompetence! I'd suggest coaching and mentoring as the fastest ways to gain insight. Even reverse mentoring where you find people of a much younger age to provide you feedback and understand how to read the ground from a skip generation away.

Journaling. One of the most effective things we can do as leaders is reflect, assess and tweak. (I'm not using a R.A.T. acronym). Journaling is such a key tool in understanding our thoughts and feelings so we can address them operationally. This is a daily practice that bears a daily, quarterly and yearly review to better understand ourselves, how we show up at work and how we can better serve our new teams.

The more higher you fly the more air pressure going to be. similar the more you go up in the career ladder more responsibly, accountability required. then comes the Emotional Hijack moments, you are seen to every the pressure to perform is high. you Ei skills will comes in very handy specially in High stake situations. 1. Self care is vital- Make sure you spend some time for you, listen to you heart beat & focus on you breath. reflect on yourself 2. Listen Actively : learn to monitor the pulse of the people through listening, you need to learn to listen to what said & not said 3. Develop mechanism show up in either situations. understand what your people want to feel & dont want to feel at work.

Adapting to a new leadership role hinges on embracing it wholeheartedly. Personally, I immersed myself in the responsibilities, learning the intricacies of the position. Show genuine enthusiasm, be open to challenges, and actively seek to understand the team dynamics. By wholeheartedly embracing the role, not only did I navigate the transition smoothly, but I also earned the trust of my team. Embracing your role is the cornerstone of a successful leadership transition.

Be confident: they hired YOU. It’s easy to second guess the value you bring into a new role or new organization. It’s normal to have a learning curve and it should be acceptable to allow time for assimilation. It’s imperative to maintain your confidence in the first 90 days. Don’t try to be the previous leader you replaced. Again, they hired YOU for your unique skillset and value, that’s what they want. No two people are alike, no two leaders are alike. It’s important however to understand what is working well, so you can maintain it and build upon it. Get things done. This is the mark of any great leader. There is always a need for action. Be the one who brings the team together and moves them forward together. No action = no value.

Everything you need to know to succeed in a new role can be sorted into 3 buckets. #1 is everything you should already know on day 1 (doctors need to have an MD or DO, financial advisors need to be licensed, etc.) #2 contains the stuff you need to learn within the first few months - the things that if you don’t pick up quickly, everyone’s confidence will wane (needs of top clients, markets your role is serving, etc.) #3 holds the things you’ll learn over a longer time, at least 6 months. These things don’t happen every day, so it’s difficult to learn them before you need them (annual review process, financial planning cycles, etc.) The 3 buckets help you organize what you know, and what you need to learn, on what timelines.

The most powerful path to leadership is through listening. Active listening leads to Empathy - the art of understanding. It is through this understanding that you gain the insight and build the relationships to create both the support and the impact you need to come excel. If there is one superpower for leadership growth, it is empathy.

As a leadership and executive coach, I often witness a recurring challenge: individuals stepping into new roles but holding fast to familiar approaches. Successfully adapting to a new leadership role demands a willingness to fully embrace change. Stepping into a new position necessitates a fresh mindset and enhanced performance. While it may be uncomfortable, summoning the courage to let go of the familiar is vital. Leaders who cling to comfort zones risk stagnation. Embrace the discomfort, learn, and elevate your performance to meet the demands of the new role. It's not just about doing what's familiar; it's about evolving to meet the challenges head-on.

For me, assuming a new leadership role in a new place is not about the technical stuff. It is about who you can engage with at all levels, from Head Office to the fields. It is about know how important decisions are made. It is about aligning priorities. So that you can make an impact but not burning yourself out.