The Unspoken Realities of First-Time Management
Inisghts for New Managers in High-Stakes Environments
I enjoy what I do and have worked hard on the never-ending journey to become world-class. My continued aim is to help my clients turn conversations about possibilities and strategies into tangible actions and results. Here are some of the recent client successes:
Gaining their first C-Suite role and a seat at the big table.
Getting the exciting job offer and contractual terms they had worked on for months.
A promotion to Managing Director.
Successfully pitching to lead the strategically important AI transformation project.
Getting more autonomy and space to succeed on their terms.
An interim role made permanent.
I never want my clients to be like the dog that caught the car - someone who has achieved their desired goal but is then unprepared and unsure of what to do next. So, we spend a lot of time exploring what's next and what it will take to succeed.
I hope you are all having success in your careers, too. To help prepare you for the realities you will likely face upon achieving your goals, here is the truth, warts and all, for those becoming first-time producer managers. These are the salespeople, traders, capital allocations, lawyers, and consultants who, mainly because of their success as individual contributors, now find themselves managing a small number of people (previously peers).
While at a more junior level than the people I coach one-to-one, becoming a new manager is a crucible moment relatively early in every successful person's career. A crucible event is a transformative experience that shapes an individual's character, skills, and future trajectory. These events are often intense and challenging, forcing individuals to confront adversity and emerge stronger. Yup, your first managerial role definitely sounds like that!
As someone considers the step up into a managerial role, here is what I think are the things
being said that they likely aren't hearing or
things that aren't being said that should be, or
questions they aren't asking that need to be asked.
In my last newsletter, we covered what management is and what managing people means, including balancing the fundamental tensions of overload, dependency, ambiguity, and conflict. That was fine for a wide-angle, fifty-thousand-foot view of management, but we now need to dampen your naive enthusiasm and replace it with cold, hard facts about what being a new manager means.
First, there is only a small chance you will be part of a high-performing team. In fact, per Curphy Leadership Solutions, a global leader in team coaching and assessment, while many leaders and organisations believe they are high-performing, their data and research show only 20% of teams are actually high-performing. This incorrect belief and attitude will likely be a headwind to broader improvement as these leaders erroneously believe there is little need to improve or do things differently. Your efforts may, therefore, not immediately be appreciated by those above you.
Second, and paraphrasing Gordon Curphy from Curphy Leadership Solutions [ref]:
All organisations want collaboration and teamwork, yet they do just about everything possible to ensure it doesn't happen! Between matrix reporting lines, frequent job rotations, leaders not getting any training on building teams or feedback on team dynamics and performance, and rewards systems incentivising individual accomplishments over collective ones, there should be little wonder that only a small minority of teams are high-performing ones.
Organisations have a lot more to do before they become team-friendly by default.
Third, it is not enough to be an excellent manager unless you work for the most enlightened firm. As a producing manager, you must still do your "own" job. Otherwise, people, typically your overly competitive peers, will start to ask what you do. And believe me, they won't have the courage to raise this while you are in the room. Instead, it will likely be when they catch up with your mutual boss or boss' boss. Which is fine when your boss has got your back. But what happens when your boss changes? What happens if a peer becomes your boss or there is a market downturn? Don't be naive - professional management is rarely explicitly rewarded or sufficiently valued. Managers who are:
Consultants still need to deliver solutions and sell to clients.
Salespeople still need to build client relationships and sell.
Traders and capital allocators still need to execute trades and manage risk.
Mergers and Acquisitions bankers still need to advise and execute deals.
Lawyers still need to provide counsel and advise their clients.
So, while a manager's output is the output of their team, as a producing manager, you will still have to perform to a high level in your "old" producing role. Don't make the mistake of taking notice of the inspirational management and leadership articles and posts on social media. They go something like this, "The only member of an orchestra who doesn't produce any music directly, the conductor, like a leader, is entirely dependent on others to deliver results." This view is valid for senior executives, especially C-Suite executives, but most definitely not for first-time managers.
Fourth, almost certainly, you are inheriting a team unless you are in a rare situation where you are creating something from scratch, i.e. a startup. It is more common to inherit an existing team. Your mandate will, therefore, be one of turning around an underperforming team, realigning the direction of a team due to changing priorities or reallocating scarce resources, or sustaining the success and building upon the good work that has already taken place. Do you know which it is for you?
This brings us to the fifth and final reality: to play the hand of cards you are dealt. What does that mean? Well, just like in any card game, such as poker, you start with a set of cards you may not have wanted. There is no point in wishing for a better hand that achieves nothing other than to waste time. Managing, building and developing a team consists of replacing the cards and upgrading your hand. You will be responsible for your team's output, not just your own. You will have people working for you who know much more about what they do than you, as you likely won't have done their job before. Some of your people will be motivated, professional subject matter experts. Others will be social loafers, who you would never have chosen to hire in the first place, happy for others to do most of the work. Different people present different challenges and opportunities.
Taking inspiration from Jeff Bezos' letter to the staff at the Washington Post newspaper in October 2024: Any first-time producing manager who doesn't recognise these points is "...paying scant attention to their reality, and those who fight reality lose. Reality is an undefeated champion."
What realities did I miss?
What about your unique situation? Are you clear on the situational context as you advance in your career? Are you listening to everything being said or picking up on things that aren't being said but should be, and are you asking all the questions you need to ask?
📫 - A quote that I am currently pondering
"We don't rise to the level of our expectations, we fall to the level of our training."
Archilochus (680-645BC)
This is a quote I return to time and time again. It emphasises the need for our continued learning and training to be greater than the change going on around us.
🤔 - If you did have the answer to this question, what would it be?
What will it take?
âš– - Et cetera
Perhaps the following will provide insight and be of help with a problem you are currently facing: