First 100 days in a new Executive Leadership role is BS
Posted on October 04, 2018 by Faiyaz Farouk, One of Thousands of Business Coaches on Noomii.
This article discusses the values and complexities of leadership and why its important for us to have realistic expectations.
I often hear the terminology that big boats turn slowly when people refer to their companies and how they make decisions. Whether it’s big business, governments, and relationships in later years, change takes time. Yet, so many people have an expectation of a new leader when taking a new role. They expect them to make changes and turn things around within the first 100 days of taking the role. If you hire an Executive, or department managers expecting them to make changes for profits and production during the first 100 days of taking on the role, this is one you’re creating a hostile work environment and setting the new leadership for immediate failure. Unless the executive has experience in the industry and the organization, it will take more than 100 days to get acquainted with the culture, politics, the “old ways” of how business has been getting done, the new leader has to build relationships, and most importantly find out who the key stakeholders are. This includes key influencers who have clout in the organization. Employers often find someone with industry experience for this very reason and expect changes and higher profits to happen rapidly. However, its been our finding that hiring leadership from outside the industry who often has different insights can greatly benefit to the organization. But that is another subject matter. In 2010, I met with a COO named Dave who was one year into his role and new to the retail industry. He’s previous experience was in consulting for the healthcare industry. Dave had created a major crisis in the organization upon the first 100 days due to the many changes he made that he was hired for. He told me during the interviews and on he’s first day, the CEO and he’s colleagues gave him directives on what they expected him to do. As a person who wanted to keep he’s job and look like a hero to he’s bosses, he took action. It took Dave over six months to see the challenges for growth and identify key stakeholders. Dave wasn’t given six months to execute major decisions, he was given 90 days. Some people quit due to the immediate changes and production fell 40%. During our coaching session, one of the decisions we made together was that he needs to reset and focus on relationships to increase production and profits. After all, he’s bosses were not happy with he’s performance. Dave applied framework I went over with him to help him to make more effective decisions, and get buy-in from stakeholders. Dave was able to save he’s job and increase production after 15 months on the job. There’s a lot of press today about the President of the United States. A lot of people who haven’t held that role in any capacity have been challenging he’s style of managing situations and using the standard framework of first 120 days in office to gauge he’s effectiveness. There is a ridiculous expectation that a new President is going to understand the country, the economics, globalization and how to solve the complexities of government life all of this within the first 120 days. Yes, I agree the person often being picked is picked because of experience and likeability; however, there is a natural law to getting acquainted with the system and how things work. I am not arguing for him or against him, but merely pointing objectively to state that sometimes the old notions and expectations needs to be update like software updates Microsoft sends out. Regardless of your political opinion, President Trump many errors are due to the fact he is new to the post, the organization of the white house, politics, understanding economics and policies, and he rushed everything for whatever reasons he had. Every major challenges needs to take time and there has to be appropriate leadership for the appropriate times. In conclusion, things take time and don’t expect your new leadership to figure it out right away and make the best decisions.Please feel free to post your constructive comments and past experiences. Follow me @faiyfar
Regards,
Faiyaz Farouk
