· 1 min read
Your first 90 days as a manager
From colleague to boss: what to do, and especially what not to do, in your first three months.
Congratulations, you're a manager. Yesterday you had coffee with your colleagues, today you assess them. Nobody prepares you for that, and most mistakes are made in the first three months.
Month 1: listen
Don't change anything yet. Really. Plan a conversation with everyone on your team and ask three questions:
- What's going well, and what should we definitely keep?
- What are you running into?
- What do you need from me?
Write down the answers and look for patterns. Your first impression is almost always incomplete.
Month 2: small wins
Pick one thing that bothers everyone and that you can fix quickly. A meeting that achieves nothing, a process that needs three signatures too many. A small win shows you listen, and earns you credit for the bigger steps.
Month 3: direction
Only now do you say where you want to go. Not as a finished plan, but as a direction your team can contribute to. People support what they helped create.
What you should definitely not do
- Keep doing everything yourself because it's faster
- Ignore your old friendships, or favour them
- Pretend you know everything
The best managers I know often say: "I don't know. What do you think?"
Don't want to do those first months alone? In a leadership programme we discuss what you run into every two weeks.
