Remember how it felt to be a manager for the first time?
Invited to speak to a group of recently promoted managers, I shared some early lessons from my mentors, formatted in bite-sized chunks for discussion. Comments and thoughts invited.
Welcome to the middle. Now that you are a manager, you must mediate between your team and those who employ you - the same as the CEO. Get used to it.
If you’ve been promoted to manage your former colleagues, know that to lead effectively, you will need to challenge and develop your team. It will be tempting to be a hero for them instead. If you do, you will not be as effective at challenging and developing.
Have a code of conduct, and live by it - Your integrity and credibility are your key assets as a leader, despite what you may see in the news. Both are assets that take time and effort to develop, and that can be damaged with a single misstep. Commit to principles of ethical behavior, and live them quietly in your day to day actions. Be about something larger than yourself.
Listen - as a manager, you will find yourself talking way too much. Develop a habit of listening more, and talking less. Surprise people by being curious, and let that curiosity guide you in conversation, whether with your boss, your peers, or the people who report to you. Listening is key to learning, and it's also a great way show respect and make people feel valued.
Do as you say - develop your credibility every day by considering commitments before making them, keeping those you make, and giving plenty of warning, asking for help, and taking responsibility when things don't go as you expected.
Learn to say "No" - and when you do, be respectful about it by explaining. Sometimes it's best to offer a choice among options that make tradeoffs clear. If your boss assigns you a task and a deadline, she may be unaware what else you have in your backlog. Integrity requires that you share these commitments and invite conversation about reordering them.
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Lead from the front - an esteemed colleague of mine tells his team "I will never ask you to do anything unless I am willing to do it myself."
Be careful with your time, and your team's time. When you start your day reflect on what really matters, where your time and effort can be most effectively spent, and set aside distractions. Get exercise, and spend time with friends and family. Nobody ever died wishing they had spent more time at the office, and many of my best insights have happened while away from the grind.
Develop great people - great leaders work themselves out of a job by building strong teams. Ask your people what they want from their careers and lives, and know them as people. Think about how to help them get where they want to be, and align where you can with the work that needs doing. Invest in developing people. Lead your team with good questions more than answers.
Hire like your career depends on it, because it does. You can only learn so much about someone from a 45 minute interview, so think carefully about your hiring process, and also recognize that you will occasionally make mistakes in hiring. Be polite but direct when people fail to meet your expectations - not all hires work out and it’s better that everyone knows where they stand rather than being surprised.
Be evidence-driven and curious - highly underrated and effective characteristics. Be sensitive to the difference between evidence and opinion, and cultivate good sources of evidence to guide your decisions. Seek to understand. Recognize when you are confused and ask clarifying questions. Be willing to revise decisions as new information becomes available. Changing a decision after careful consideration is a sign of strength, not weakness.
Learn how to identify a good business opportunity and make a case for it. This includes being specific about what success looks like, how it will be measured, and how it benefits the company. To be successful, you must take your investors’ perspective, making clear the decision, necessary investment, planned approach, risks, and expected returns. Ask yourself what you can stop doing to free up cash or capacity to address the opportunity.
Master's student in Clinical Psychology | Practicum Trainee Candidate
2 年This is an amazing summary, focusing on curiosity and holistic growth through relationships. Thank you so much. I am in training to be a therapist, and the Venn diagram between manager methods and therapist methods has astounding overlap - both are focused on helping people grow with self-awareness.
Hi John, great article , I would add , find yourself a mentor , a leader you look up to admire. Ask for help from your trusted peers , mentors or your own manager. You may never have all the answers
Product Management Leader | UC Berkeley Haas MBA
2 年Hey John, great stuff! I'd add as a new manager, expect to learn a whole new skill set in management, having a good heart is not enough. Build systems to get stuff done, and build-measure-learn on the system. If the system fails or is underperforming, fix the system, resist the urge to jump in and "do it yourself." Many new managers were previous high performing ICs and this one may be hard to let go :) In my first management role it felt like a career reset. I thought I knew what I was doing, after all I've read so many books and watched youtube videos, also had the opportunity to observe some of the best in action ;) But nothing can prepare for a reality kick to the face. Murphy's law rings true. Foster resiliency to roll with the punches, accept that as a newbie manager I kind of suck at it, and having a mentor really helped. Last is communications; managerial communications are a different beast than IC communications, even for highly cross-functional roles like program management or product management. On the one hand there is communicating up and managing the executive dynamics, on the other hand communicating with the team to keep them informed and empowered. Definitely a balancing act!