First 100 days

I have some strongly held views about what executives should do in the early days of any role, based partly on personal exprience as an HR professional and coach and partly on general observation of leaders moving into challenging roles in other walks of life.

There is a lot of "stuff" out there that can be read, and I will try to make some links to this later. I will also pull together a few stories of folks whom I have helped in their early days. However as a start (and as my first ever "Blog") I wanted to lay out the elements of what I have found to be most important to executives as they enter into a new role. This stands true for individuals moving into an organisation from outside as well as for internal appointments, although in the former case more care needs to be given to understanding the organisation and more of that later. And incidentally I acknowledge that I take an idealistic view of how to make this happen, and have struggled with organisations for years to implement that idealistic view - but it is worth the fight!

Point one: Stop doing your old role before you start your new role.

Make sure that you get a proper ending, from both a professional and personal perspective, and then try and take a break in order to establish mental and emotional freshness--only then start your appointment.

Point two: Know yourself.

Be clear about what you bring to the new role that you are proud of - skills, leadership capabilities, experience and hold on tightly to your self-esteem. It will be tested!

Furthermore, reflect upon who you are as a leader; know how you are seen by colleagues, bosses and reports; understand what shadow and light you cast on those around you. If you have not done so already, consider doing a personality inventory such as the MBTI in order to build this self-awareness.

Point three: Get to know the organisation.

Of course you will invest time in researching the business - that is table stakes. But also think of building a map of the organisation that shows formal structures, decision-making processes, informal power structures and relationships (the dreaded "p" word), culture, climate and the impact of the external environment. This is a very conscious exercise, and takes some time - but it is worth it.

Point four: Plan your influencing strategy.

Ask yourself what the key objectives are that you have in the role, and work out whom it is that you will have to influence. Get to know them, what they are like, how they like to work, how best to influence them. And make a conscious plan for how you are going to do this.

Point five: Establish yourself as the leader of your team.

Be clear about who you are as a leader, and right from the start express your leadership with complete authenticity. Be clear also about how you want your leadership to be seen by other parts of the organisation, such as peers and the next level up. Be authentic!

Point six: Understand the task.

Then, and in my view only then, get on with being clear about the nature of the business task that faces you; the content of the role, the objectives and the context in which your own role contributes to the business (desperately important in matrixed organisations and more on this later perhaps); the metrics that apply to the role. Define success with your boss and make it tangible. And so on.

And with regard to all of the above - look for help and support.

More at another time.

Yours aye
David Thomas