Leadership
Your first 90 days as a new manager
You were promoted for being excellent at the work. The job you have now is almost none of that work. Here’s how to spend the first three months.
Follow-on to “You were promoted for the wrong skill.” That piece is the why; this one is the what-to-do.
Month one: listen more than you change
The biggest mistake new managers make is proving they deserved the promotion by changing things fast. Resist it. You don’t know enough yet, and your team is watching to see what kind of manager you’ll be.
- Meet with every person on your team, one-on-one. Ask: What’s working? What’s getting in your way? What do you wish your last manager had done differently?
- Ask your own manager what success looks like at 90 days. Write it down. Check back.
- Notice what you miss doing. You’ll want to keep doing the old job. That’s the trap.
Month two: have the conversation you’re avoiding
By now you know who’s struggling, what’s broken and which conversation you’ve been putting off. There’s always one.
- Have it. Prepare for their side, not just yours: what do they want here that’s legitimate?
- Set a regular one-on-one with each person and protect it. Cancelling it tells them where they rank.
- Start handing over the work you used to do. It will be done differently. Different is not wrong.
Month three: build the habits that last
- Give feedback weekly, in small doses, not in one big quarterly event. Praise specifically; correct privately.
- Decide what you’ll stop doing. Every new responsibility needs something to make room for it.
- Go back to your manager with the 90-day list. What’s done, what’s not, what you’ve learned.
The mistakes almost everyone makes
- Staying the best individual contributor on the team.
- Avoiding the hard conversation because they’re friends with the person.
- Waiting until they feel ready to lead. Readiness shows up once you are already doing it.
- Doing it alone. Nobody hands you a manual, and asking for one feels like admitting something. It isn’t.
The point
Your job is no longer to do the work well. It’s to make the work go well. The first 90 days are when you learn the difference, or don’t.
If you’re in your first few months and want a second brain on it, that’s exactly the kind of thing coaching is for.
