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Transitioning into a New leadership Role |Dodging Landmines

Sometimes people can be promoted to positions they weren’t ready for, and didn’t necessarily even want. Tanya Goodwin-Maslach, Executive Coach at Elevati Inc., says rather than doing all the work yourself, focus on building trust with your team members to improve your chances of success.

Speaker: Tanya Goodwin-Maslach, Executive Coach, Elevati Inc.,

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Tags: Dodging Landmines, Management, leadership, promotion, layoffs, team, productivity, downturn, economy, relationships

 
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    Chris Witt

    01/20/09 | Report as spam

    RE: Transitioning into a New leadership Role |Dodging Landmines

    I like and agree with Tanya's main points. She slipped in, almost as an aside, a very important issue that I keep seeing with my clients. It's a variation on "what got you where you are won't get you where you want to go." As Tanya points out, it's because they were so good at their technical skills that they got promoted, but now they have to rely less on those skills and more on their relational skills.

    My clients have a similar issue. As a speech coach I'm often called in to work with newly promoted leaders who are good at giving technical briefings. But in their new positions they have to learn how to give a different kind of speech: one that is concerned less with communicating information and more with communicating a direction or a vision.

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    tgmaslach

    02/08/09 | Report as spam

    RE: Transitioning into a New leadership Role |Dodging Landmines

    Hi Chris,
    I think "unlearning" something, whether it be a belief or a habit, is the hardest thing to do....and the belief that technical skills will help a leader build an effective and successful team is a prominent one. Difficult to change, and subsequently, difficult to change the associated behavior.
    Would love to hear more about your speech consulting...fascinating! I've not heard of such specific type of work.
    Thank you for chatting.
    Tanya

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    george bradt

    03/23/09 | Report as spam

    RE: Transitioning into a New leadership Role |Dodging Landmines

    While joining an organization from the outside involves positioning yourself for the first time, getting promoted from within often requires repositioning yourself to people who already know you. There are three key differences when you are promoted from within versus joining from the outside:

    1. You can?t control the context,
    so prepare in advance and be ready to adjust as required in planned, unplanned, or interim changes, securing resources and support along the way.

    2. It is hard to make a clean break,
    so take control of your own transition by managing the internal announcement cascade and how key stakeholders learn about your promotion, securing your base and managing first impressions in the new role.

    3. There is no honeymoon,
    so quickly accelerate team progress after the start by evolving the stated and de facto strategies, improving operations, and strengthening the organization.

    George Bradt
    PrimeGenesis Executive Onboarding and Transition Acceleration
    www.primegenesis.com

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Transitioning into a New leadership Role |Dodging Landmines

Sometimes people can be promoted to positions they weren’t ready for, and didn’t necessarily even want. Tanya Goodwin-Maslach, Executive Coach at Elevati Inc., says rather than doing all the work yourself, focus on building trust with your team members to improve your chances of success.

>> I was placed in a new leadership role as a result of some personnel changes but, gosh, I am having such a tough time getting my new

team to focus, what can I do?

>> This is such a common problem right now especially in the economy where there are so many personnel changes, that managers are getting

moved up the ladder to occupy leadership roles that they may not even be ready for. In fact, studies show that 40% of executives that

take on new roles derail in their first 18 months on the job and it's due primarily to one thing, relationship building, that's your key.

>> Well, I have to say sometimes it sounds like it would be just easier for me to just do all the work, pick up the slack and just do

it myself.

>> That's right and it's so much easier for so many managers to do that because you're technically geniuses you've moved up for a reason,

but you occupy a different role now and that is, you occupy a role to be a support mechanism for your team. So there's 3 things you

have to do, first, meet with your team and find out, learn what their idea of the businesses strategy is get a good idea of what they

think the business is. Second thing is ask individuals on the team what they think their role is in executing on that strategy. And

the third and final thing you have to do is meet with the team and ask them, "What can you do in order to improve the chances of their

success," because ultimately you're trying to build trust and you can't do that unless you get that input from them.

>> What do I need to do to work better with my team as a team leader?

>> Well, it's all about building trust ultimately in the end and so you have to move away from this idea of, I'm gonna be -- I'm gonna

show everyone what a rock star I am, I can do all the work. By doing that you relieve everyone of the accountability of doing the work,

they don't give you any credibility and you lose all their trust, so the biggest thing that you can do is show them that you're there

to help them be successful and the only way to do that is to reiterate that message over and over. You're in relationship building

mode, just remember that.

>> In summary?

>> In summary the most important thing for you to remember when you're doing this with a new team is, you didn't have the chance to

build relationships with your team before you got slammed into that new role so it's time to do that now. Gauge where they're at in

understanding the business, gauge where they're at in understanding their role in the business and figure out what it is that you can

do to help the team be successful over the long run.