Succeed as a New Manager

How to Inspire Your Team and be a Great Boss

Bloomsbury Publishing

• Publisher: A&C Black Business Information and Development
• Year: 2009
• Print ISBN: 9780713675245
• eBook ISBN: 9781408134085
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Personal Development
• Subtopic: Human Resource Management

It's great to have a new challenge at work. Managing others, though,
can be a daunting new responsibility and can be tricky if you're now
the boss of former colleagues or friends. Packed with practical advice,
it will help you sail through issues such as getting to know your team,
dealing with internal politics, motivating others, and celebrating
success.

Whatever your new job, Succeed As a New Manager will help you
find your feet and get great results along the way. This book also
includes a quiz, step-by-step action points, common mistakes and advice
on how to avoid them, top tips, and lists of handy Web links and
further reading.

1 Settling into your new job

Congratulations! Your promotion campaign has been successful and you’re now a manager. You’re likely to be responsible for managing a team of up to 15 people, either in a company you already work for, or in a new organisation. This is obviously very exciting for you, though you may feel a bit daunted at the prospect, especially if you were previously a member of the team you will now be managing.

However, provided you follow a few basic rules, there is no reason why such fears can’t easily be overcome, and your new role will give you excellent scope to stretch your wings and fulfil your potential. This chapter will give you these basic rules and help to smooth the path forward into this new phase of your working life.

Step one: Think about some key questions

1 I’m worried I might not be up to the job. How can I overcome my nerves?

It’s only natural to have some feelings along these lines, and most people do when faced with a new challenge. Try to keep your worries under control, though, as a crisis of confidence may affect your chance of success. Keep positive and remind yourself of your skills and competence to do the job—after all, the company has recognised them, otherwise you wouldn’t have been offered the role! Look after your health too: make sure you get plenty of sleep and exercise, so you feel fighting fit and ready to take on anything.

2 Is it likely that my new job will affect my home life?

Almost certainly, yes. Moving into any new job can be stressful, and even more so when new or extra levels of responsibility are involved. The trick is to make sure you’re prepared for it, and face the fact that your life may be more demanding than ever before. Talk this over with your family and friends at an early stage; it will be a huge help if they are ready to lend their support while you get to grips with your new role, and also keep ‘home’ distractions to a minimum as you’re settling in so that you can focus.

3 Will I need to change my persona at work?

No, not essentially, but you may need to adjust your attitude and the way you think about your job. A lot of management is about standing back from the detail and seeing the ‘big picture’ of what is happening so that you can make strategic decisions about how to act. Rather than getting involved in the nitty-gritty of individual tasks (as you may have done as a team member), try to take an objective overview. If you can learn to see the wood for the trees, you’ll naturally behave in a way that suits the circumstances.

Step two: Research and plan your new job

First things first: if you’re moving to a new company to take up your job, find out everything possible about it, the department or section you’ll be in, the job itself, and anything else you can think of.

If you’re moving up the ranks at your current place of work, you’ll know much of this already, but, whatever the situation, don’t prejudge what you’re going to find and don’t be bound by what you’ve done before or how any of your previous employers operated.

From all this information, try to form at least a tentative plan in advance—it’s much harder to do this once you’re in the post. For example, what do you want to achieve? How might you need to develop yourself to match the new demands? Think honestly about your strengths and weaknesses: how can you use your qualities and experience to their best advantage and compensate for your limitations?

TOP TIP

If possible, you could make some discreet inquiries about your predecessor: why he or she left, what management style they preferred, how people responded to that, what may need to be changed, and so on. Again, if you’re not moving companies you may know some of this already, but try to take a more balanced view of things and try to see things from the other person’s perspective too.

Step three: Engage with your team

Once you start your new job, make this your first priority. You need to know:

the purpose of your department, team, or unit and its goals

the work being done

the current state of play

any customer expectations that need to be met

Get all your team members together as soon as possible to introduce yourself, and then arrange meetings with each of them individually. Keep these meetings as friendly and informal as you can, but allow a generous amount of time and plan some kind of framework for the discussion. Listen carefully to what people have to say, and get information about them as individuals. Most importantly, ask each person the question: what should I do or not do to help you perform your job effectively?

TOP TIP

Listening—and tuning in properly—to your team’s concerns is a key part of your early days in a new job. That doesn’t mean for a moment that you should promise them the moon, but simply that you’ll be in a much better position to represent those concerns to your own managers. You need to be able to fight your team’s corner.

Step four: Plan some ‘quick wins’

Next, plan a few targets that you can hit quickly and easily, all of which will help you to feel more at home and on top of things. Achieving these also eases the pressure you feel to perform and create a positive first impression and begins the relationship-building process. Quick wins might include things like familiarising yourself with systems or ways of working if you’re new to the company (for example, the internal e-mail system); setting up an early discussion with your line manager, arranging introductory meetings with suppliers or customers (external and internal), or even taking your team to the pub one lunchtime.

Step five: Clarify what expectations others have of you

You may be lucky enough to have been given a detailed job description, but the chances are there are still large gaps in your understanding of the task and priorities, what is or isn’t acceptable in the new environment, and on what criteria you will be judged by your boss, peers, customers, and others. Don’t be afraid to ask a lot of questions to clarify these issues, and then be very honest with yourself. Can you meet these standards? If not, what might you need to do? Who could help, and what might the price be?

The perils of the ‘new broom’ syndrome

While you’ll be keen to get going in your new role and make your mark, do tread carefully—at least to start with. Don’t assume that your new team will welcome your style or your ideas with open arms, even if your predecessor was unpopular. Before you can count on their support and co-operation, they need to feel that they can trust you and that you...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• How do you rate as a new manager?
• 1 Settling into your new job
• 2 Building great teams
• 3 Developing your leadership skills
• 4 Communicating assertively in the workplace
• 5 Delegating without guilt
• 6 Giving and receiving feedback positively
• 7 Fighting back against information overload
• 8 Building your network of contacts
• Where to find more help