Leading a New Team? Here's How to Make the Most of Your First 100 Days

The Surprise Start

Read Time: 4 minutes 33 seconds.

As I sat sweating in an unseasonably warm office one November afternoon, my boss walked in, carefully shut the door, and sat down with a drawn-out groan.

After an awkwardly long pause and a careful cleaning of his glasses, he offered me a choice: "Good news or bad news?"

"Bad," I said, taking the apparent starting point he wanted.

"We're restructuring. Next week. 8% of the workforce. I need your names by the end of the week."

Which begged an obvious follow-up question, "With two people on my team, how exactly shall I give you my 8%?"

"Ah, so you want the good news then."

"Sure," I said, immediately sensing the good news had a catch.

"Your team is 25 people now. I've already figured out my 8%." He slid a roster across my desk and stood up to leave.

"Oh, and congrats on the promotion. Good work."

How to Make an Entrance

While there are less dramatic ways to start leading a new team, it is seldom simple. You could be changing companies, relocating your family to a new country to open an office, or battlefield promoted after an unexpected departure.

Regardless, everyone has a new Day 1, when all eyes turn to you with a mixture of hope and heartache, scrutiny and skepticism. You offer a buoyant future with fewer problems and bear the heavy weight of a present loaded with them.

So how will you make the most of this moment?

Your team's attention will never be more focused than when you first meet them. Don't squander this moment by winging it.

Leaders are expert orchestrators.
And this is your first act.

There are two players - your manager and you - and this works best when you both play your role.

Your Manager's Role -> Raise Expectations

• Show your credibility - Why they selected you and how you've succeeded in the past. Praise from them builds credibility.

• Create the scoreboard for you - What they expect of you and how they'll know you're succeeding. Without this, the team will create their own way of assessing you.

Your Role -> Lower Expectations

• Show your humility - Why you're excited and what you're like, including your strengths and especially your flaws.

• Create the scoreboard for them - How you plan to come up to speed and what they should expect from you while you come up the curve. Avoid the trap of promising beyond that horizon, as you don't have the necessary knowledge yet.

Now, how should this happen? Meeting? Email? I would do whatever I can to make it live - meeting, zoom, or record a Loom video. They need to hear you, see your excitement, and feel your curiosity.

But what if I'm a new manager? It doesn't matter. You want the full-throated endorsement of the person who made the bet you on without you having to sing your own praises.

Won't this announcement set expectations too high? Guess what? Expectations are already high. Every problem every person faces every day, you're their new solution.

Should I take questions? Absolutely. But be cautious. Questions about you, what you're like, and your preferences should all be easy to answer (especially with your Personal User Manual on the ready).

But the trap is questions about the business, their work, and what changes you plan to make. Use the opportunity to remind them of the arc of your 100-day plan, how you'll make important decisions, and how they'll help shape the answers.

My last word of advice. This is Day 1 of being the leader you want to be. Whether stepping up on the same team or new to the organization, this is your chance to show them what you want to be known for next.

It's a ceremony, a marker, a passage. Honor it. 

And now, let's get to work.

How to Make an Impression

Now that the race has started, you need to execute your plan.

Having helped hundreds of managers onboard in my career, you can break your onboarding plan into 3 phases:

• Understand

• Synthesize

• Execute

Let's take each one separately.

Phase 1: Understand. 

• Gather data. You want to learn as much as possible about the relevant force in (and on) your business.

• Build trust. You also want to accelerate genuine connection with the people you need to run your business.

The good news?

Your ignorance is your greatest asset. You can ask the questions others are too afraid of. That humble curiosity will build trust, encouraging people to revel even more.

Phase 2: Synthesize.

• Convert the data into insight. Find patterns. Highlight hot spots. In some cases, you'll find holes in your understanding. Circling back shows thoroughness and care.

• Convert the team into followers. Every leader needs followers. Build your point of view collaboratively to get your team and other participants to buy in. They'll follow the plan they write.

• Convert the meetings into a rhythm. Stay purpose-driven and lean. But start to establish your meeting cadence and communication norms.

What will determine your success in this phase is your ability to separate big from small. If everything is urgent, no one will know what’s important. And this phase should not end with a big reveal but slowly accumulate into the next.

Phase 3: Execute. 

Having good ideas is necessary but not sufficient. Building sustainable impact requires inspiring your team to take action.

• Win. You'll need to balance near-term wins with building more sustainable processes.

• Learn. Putting your ideas into action will produce the highest volume of new data. Make sure you consistently fold it into your Understanding and refine your Synthesis.

If you've been reading the MGMT Playbook, you know I focus on building repeatable systems. Why?

One word: Compounding.

Most leaders will jump right in and start doing. This approach keeps the output steady as they run the team.

Smart leaders will spend their time looking for improvements. They'll stack these wins, and their impact will improve steadily over time.

But how about Intentional leaders? The ones who always see one step ahead? The ones who magically always have time for their people?

They've figured out the secret is to get better at getting better. 

It takes patient investment early but accelerates massively later. This tradeoff for the payoff is why so few leaders make the logical choice.

And the best way I've learned to trigger this compounding is to abide by three fundamental principles:

• Maintain a high-fidelity picture of what excellent looks like. A clear direction is what separates momentum from motion.

• Proactively hunt the right problems to solve (not just the ones that find you).

• Build on top of what we've already learned. Systems are the way we share that as a team.

This intentional approach to your first 100 days might feel different. Good, that's why it will help you stand apart.

• Our approach is proactive. The other is reactive.

• Our approach is an investment. The other is an expense.

• Our approach compounds your impact. The other rewards your effort.

Intentional leaders are Exponential leaders.

And exponential leadership is what the future requires.

How to Make It Work

Leading a new team is lonely. Your team is nervous. Your manager is too busy. Your peers are skeptical.

What you need is a sage guide to show you the path. A seasoned coach to cheer you on. An executive producer in your ear whispering, “Now!”

That’s what I’m building.

I’m offering a 50% discount to 25 Beta testers to give me feedback on Phase 1 starting next week. Applications are due by 6/18.

How to Make Me Work (For You)

We want the MGMT Playbook to help you win. So help us help you.

Reply back to this email with a current management challenge you’d like help unlocking.

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Thank you for reading. Appreciate you!

Dave