Create your own first 90 days

Introduction?

My new role commenced on the 6th of April 2022, a little over one month after my colleague and good friend Michael Braidwood.?

Like Michael, I was exceptionally excited, with a new role not only being a change of club but involved repatriating back to the United Kingdom having spent eighteen years in the Middle East. The added learning opportunity of moving from proprietary to private members was equally intriguing.?

As agreed, we would refrain from the usual approach of reading and research and instead work from the 30-60-90-day plan that embodied the recruitment and interview process. This is certainly not a ‘what to do’ guide and rather a summation of ‘what I did’, for better or for worse!?

30 Days – The Sponge

Regardless of your level of experience, new is always exciting. During your recruitment, there will likely be some form of discovery into the inner workings, however, you cannot be presumptuous enough to claim to have a full understanding of the club’s operation.?

In my situation, the Royal Automobile Club has been around since 1897 and the first golf course was established in 1915. What I know for certain is that the club survived a long time before me and will likely do so a long time after! Taking the time to listen and observe is paramount. There are exceptions I’m sure, where a situation calls for a quick turnaround, but nine times out of ten, a little patience will go a long way.?

·??????17,000 is a lot of Hello’s!?

Whilst meeting team members is important, visibility is key. One area I was keen to tackle was meeting as many of the expansive membership as possible. Fortunately, after arriving shortly after the beginning of the season, the competitions provided a great opportunity to give our starters a break and meet as many as possible.?

The club has 17,000 members, however of which approximately 1,200-1,500 are regular golfers. In consideration, there are a lot of hellos to be said and as someone who requires a to-do list, for his to-do lists, a lot of memory exercises!?

·???????“Those that fail to learn from history are doomed to repeat it”.

The famous words of Winston Churchill are probably a little too serious for the golf industry, however, taking the time to learn about the club’s rich history is an important step to gaining member confidence and helping to answer many initial questions.?

With a busy club, a multitude of systems and processes are in place. The majority of which for very good reason, once you understand what has occurred in the past. This can go a long way to improving operational efficiencies, however, you need to understand the history first.?

In respect to The Royal Automobile Club, the club dates to its founding in 1895 with a rich motoring heritage. The club offers two venues, Pall Mall located in central London and Woodcote Park located in Surrey. The unique proposition being the one club, across two clubhouses providing an opportunity for all 17,000 members.?

Understanding this motoring heritage, the development of golf at Woodcote Park and how the club has evolved over the years to become a thriving members club is an important task. Whilst I certainly made a start within the first 30 days, there is plenty of learning to do!

·??????“You have been hired to have an opinion”.?

One of the more interesting aspects of maintaining a considered approach to any new role is the need to get involved and make decisions.?

Whilst learning and taking the time to listen and observe is critical, there is still a need to make an impact. You cannot shy away from decision-making, so you might as well get stuck in. One of the areas, I have been cautious of is avoiding impulsive decisions void of research or fact-checking. So, the key takeaway is, it is good to make decisions, it is not good to make poorly informed decisions.?

·??????Organization.?

Being organized and organizing your thoughts or plans for that matter have been critical to my first 30 days. It was Winston Churchill who said, “to improve is to change to perfect is to change often”. Over my first 30 days my opinion changed frequently as to what my plans should include or not include. To be honest I extended this process out well beyond to 90days, as whilst I had a good idea of what I wanted to achieve. I didn’t have a great one! The benefit of patience is the assurance or confidence that you have considered your decisions and objectives in more detail. Combined with a daily commute around the M25, I had plenty of time for thought!

60 Days – The Contributor

It is at this stage, where you could be fooled into thinking, “I know it all”. Whilst I personally felt the development of a strong working knowledge, there was still a lot to learn! With a self-confessed obsession with spreadsheets, it was time to get measuring!

Several key projects were left ready for review and pick up. So, a good proportion of the second 60days, was spend evaluating these projects and ‘why’ certain decisions had been made. The club are very keen to develop and reinvest back into the club, which is exceptionally positive.?

·??????Working with the wider team

The other key aspect of my second 60days, was ‘our people’. Whilst you could certainly argue that ‘the staff’ are more important than the ‘members’ and vice versa, my approach to this was very much cemented by the optics of the situation. The reality is, I am surrounded by a very able team and whilst they certainly deserve attention, the members need to see you ‘immediately’. So having started a few competitions and met the members regularly, the second month allowed for more departmental reviews and getting to know the wider team. I stand by my statement, that I have a very able and talented team, but a good leader need to ‘enable’ them to succeed. So, my objective is to ensure they have the tools and resources available to execute plans and objectives. Sounds easier said than done and have some wonderful takeaways from getting to know the inner workings of the club and team.??

·??????Establishing measurement tools.?

How do you measure success? What does success look like? The outcome of these questions is the establishment of the KPI’s that drive performance and essentially keep the members and committee happy!?

The use of various LQA assessments is certainly helpful and we use 59Club to help provide an impartial analysis of where we are as a club. But the core of the operation is working with our day-to-day members and ensuring the ability to book, play and enjoy a refreshment afterwards is as simple and efficient as possible.?

If there are any obstacles, the key is in communication.?

·??????Communication?

There will also be secondary schools or thought, but my preference has always been to share as much as possible and most importantly ‘why’!?

The most important aspect of communication, has been learning what’s effective? It is not always the same in every environment and each circumstance requires a refined approach. When to call, when to meet in person, when to mass communicate, when to write a report. It is often the forgotten skill, that having great ideas and a sincere approach, doesn’t mean anything if you cannot convey this in a way that is best received by the audience (whomever they might be). I am often reminded that communication is both the giving and receiving of information, so you must find both how you communicate best…. Yes. But also how is the best way for the audience to receive the right message?

I have some strong takeaways from my second 60days, where I have started to understand what works best in my current environment. This helps ensure that when you mean well, it is also understood and known by your team and membership!?

90 Days – The Leader

After the 90day mark, it will be ignorant to say I have a full understanding of the club. It is such a unique facility, with so many moving parts, continuous learning will be a function of the role.?

Having established relationships with the various committees and team members, I have built a knowledge base that provides the confidence to execute the plans developed over the initial three months.?

Confidence is an interesting subject for something that is not tangible but holds an influencing role over how effective you can be in each role. For me confidence comes from a trust established with the team around you. An assurance that the skills you have acquired with allow you to make good decisions.?

Having come away from the first 90days, I can confidently say, I have a resource and development plan for the team, as well as a 5year investment strategy for the reinvestment back into the club.?

A Greek proverb that always that I made a note of almost as soon as I heard it was, “A society grows great when old men plant trees, the shade of which they know they will never sit in”. This reminded me the roles we might play in clubs such as the ones, myself and Mike have joined. The clubs have been around for such long times, with so much history. Maybe it is not about making quick changes that you can hang your hat on, but rather make conscientious decisions that future club managers and members alike will be thankful you made at the time.?

Summary

The first 90days has been an exceptional learning curve, combined with some positive achievement. Rome certainly wasn’t built in a day, but what about something that is already built? Turning the wheel and being a good custodian of a club that is steeped in history is something I am consciously aware of. What I can confidently say, is that my first 90days has laid a strong foundation for building trust and confidence within our people, membership, committees, and board.?

Michael Braidwood's First 90 days

Introduction?

Starting a new job is an interesting topic and a challenge that many an industry professional will encounter during their careers. There are certainly successful careers that start and finish within the same club, company, or organization, however for those who do move to new pastures, what is the best strategy for your first 90 days??

In a unique situation of starting new roles at similar times, there is an opportunity to compare experiences and learn from the observations.?A key observation that struck a chord during co-writing this article early on, is just how similar and different our first 90-days were.?From the ‘get stuck in’ approach, to the ‘learn and observe’, we have uncovered some similarities whilst opting for different strategies.?

New Job

I started a new job on 1st March 2022 as the CEO of Bruntsfield Links Golfing Society in Edinburgh.

I was excited about the opportunity. It took around five months from getting the job offer to actually starting, so as you can imagine your mind starts running wild as you start to make plans for your new venture.

One key decision I made was not to read a book on the first 90 days, I felt that would cloud my judgement and maybe steer me in a direction that I didn’t need to go.

A colleague and good friend of mine Rhys Beecher was also going to be starting a new job soon after me, so we agreed to not read any books on the first 90 days and then document what our first 90 days were like, so we could co write an article on it, encouraging people not to pay any attention to it and start off with a clear head!!

Here is what I did.

Got to know the Board

I was lucky, I had managed to meet a number of the Board during the interview process. However even better I was invited to a Board meeting 2 weeks before I commenced in my role. It didn’t scare me off! But what it did do was show me how solid the Society’s governance was. After commencing, our Board had a few special Board meetings to deal with a particular pressing issue, we had our AGM and a full Board meeting a few days later. All these meetings really helped me understand how the Board and Board members ticked and the direction they wanted to steer the Society.

Get to know the management team

Prior to commencing I ‘LinkedIn’ with those members of the team who were on LinkedIn, a sort of informal hello. I then sent them a Professional development interview which I asked them to fill out in readiness for my arrival. This really helped the conversation flow in our initial one to one meetings. Very quickly we established a rapport and became comfortable working with each other.

Share your initial vision… the why

By my second week I shared with the management team the direction we were going to take. During the interview process and subsequent meetings with the Captain, Vice-Captain and Board members it was clear to me that they were looking for ongoing improvement to ensure BLGS achieved its vision of being the leading Edinburgh Golf Club.

I am a big fan of Kaizen and have used that philosophy wherever I have worked in the past. I also love the video the All-England Tennis Club produced about 6 years ago called The List. It’s only 50 seconds long, but pretty much encapsulates what Kaizen is all about. This straightforward concept of continuous improvement is easy to understand, and I encouraged the team to create their lists and in doing so they have ownership and I have commitment.

Meet as many members as possible?

It’s so easy when you start a new job to get stuck in meetings and behind your desk planning and implementing change, whilst also learning a whole new set of systems.

What was important to me was to walk the club lounge a couple of times a day and start introducing myself to as many members as possible.

We have 1,200 members, so I need to keep this up and build it into my daily routine. My love of tea helps with frequent visits to the lounge for a top up! This gets me out of the office and into the face of the membership.

Be available and say yes to every invite

Your time in the early days of a new job is precious, but making yourself available to your new colleagues, members, vendors is essential. Further accept every invite you get to social events, games of golf and dinners. You might be tired and feeling the strain, but these invites are key as you start to build up the pulse of the club, in these social settings you hear a lot about the likes and dislikes, the good ideas and the not so good!?

Have your plan…. But?

As Dwight Eisenhower said, “plans are useless, but planning is indispensable” or as Muhammed Ali said, “your fight plan is accurate until the first punch is thrown”, however both agree that despite the variances you always need a plan before you commence. For sure the road will not be a straight one and you will deviate from side to side and get sidetracked by other unforeseen pressing issues. That’s ok but stay committed to your plan and by continually reverting back to it you will see it through.

You will have multiple lists on the go, what you want / need to do, what your team need you to do, what the Board want you to do and what the members expect you to do. The lists will be never ending, but don’t despair you will get on top of them. I use the 4 Ds?

·??????Do

·??????Delay (some are not urgent)

·??????Delegate – once you find your feet you will find whose job you can enrich by delegating to them?

·??????Dump – occasionally something goes on the list, that at the time was a good idea, but after a short period of time it turns out not to be

Positivity kills the nay slayers and sets the tone

Golf clubs can be negative places at times and some members love to hang onto the negatives in an attempt to steer you down the wrong path.

A positive attitude and a spring in your step kill the nay slayers and sets the tone.

In the first 90 days I have not had to deal with –?

1.??????Any complaints … only feedback and ideas

2.??????Any issues … only challenges that can be resolved

Very quickly you set a positive tone that quickly becomes infectious amongst the team, positivity breeds positivity.

Video every room in the facility / take photos and keep a track of the changes?

I videoed every room in the facility, so I can look back in a few months / years’ time and see the physical evidence of change. I also keep a registrar of the changes and new things that have been implemented. This is useful to report to the Board, it can also help you tell a great story of changing something from good to great and it is also cathartic to review after your first year as often you forget the things you have instigated.

Marginal gains

I was really impressed by the work Sir Dave Brailsforth did with Team Sky … from nowhere to Tour De France winners! His mantra was marginal gains which in effect means do a lot of small changes and the sum of those has a big impact. I’ve managed to implement a number of tiny changes here and there that over time will make a big difference, however, have been picked up by a number of members and colleagues. Such as name badges, employee induction, WhatsApp communication groups, monthly facility audits, better menu covers, and so on.

Take some ‘risks’

It’s a fine balance between being told you are fully autonomous and actually being fully autonomous. I have kind of stuck myself in the middle, keeping the Board informed of a majority of my decisions, whilst making some that I believe are for the best of the Society. These might feel risky at the time, but again you can always defend yourself by doing the right thing / best for the Society.

F&B focus group

One of my projects is to improve our F&B offering, let’s say taking it from good to great. F&B is always a hot topic at clubs and with 1,200 members you are very likely to have a great variety of wants, needs and ideas.

In order to gather this information, I hosted a F&B focus group which got a god cross section of the membership in a room together to give feedback and suggestions on some of our key F&B concerns.

The outcome was excellent, and we gather some very valuable information. However most importantly it demonstrated to the membership that we were listening and we’re up for change.

Summary

It’s been a whirlwind first 90 days and I can safely say my list(s) are longer now than when I first started! However, I feel our team here now really understand what Kaizen is and the importance of continuous improvement. The first 90 days have been a great learning curve for me, but more importantly I’ve managed to lay some solid foundations for the future.

A good first 90days…. For both of us!

Good luck with your next move.