My first weeks as a manager

I’ve always thought to myself, gosh if someone could just write an article about the first step into that adventure… That would help me understand what I’m getting myself into. And what you wish for yourself you should also allow another :-).

As some of you might know, I’ve set the goal to become a CTO one day. Why? Simply because I know I thrive best when I’m balancing my background in technical in-depth knowledge in combination with stimulating business and therefore the company to transform itself to a situation in which technology can cultivate business opportunity and outcome. That’s way too long of a sentence, but I love it. I love understanding ‘the system’ at every level, to understand where it’s broken and to progressively adjust and plant the right stimuli to become a better version of itself.

In order to do that more efficiently, one of the steps you need to be willing to make is become a manager. You simply can’t do a successful transformation when you are alone in your quest. And to be fair, it’s not efficient nor fun as well. When you try to do this on your own, at times you can feel like a tugboat against a giant oil tanker, hoping the other -bigger- tugboats aren’t applying too much force in the (in your mind) ‘wrong’ directions. I wrote about this in my article ‘when a big company slows you down’

This leads me to the question my manager (and leader) asked me not too long ago.

“If you intend to become a manager, answer me this: how will you scale yourself” — Robert van der Toorn

What a question! I thought.. First I had to contemplate on what he exactly meant with that to be perfectly honest…

Scaling yourself

I’ve been searching myself and some people I trust as inspiring leaders to form my opinion on this matter.

What Robert meant was: managing comes at a cost. Where you were able to go into details and guide processes and projects before, you’ll quickly find yourself unable to manage your agenda once you are responsible for ten highly capable colleagues.

This simply means that you will have to find different ways to ensure success. What worked for you in your previous role, will render you incapable in the next.

Of course it’s easy to read any management book and use common sense, being aware and sitting with this fact changes everything. Perhaps first and foremost because all your spider senses on your productivity and success are rendered invalid. Where it once was your job to be responsible for certain topics, it now becomes your job to be responsible for the wellbeing of your team members, followed by the outcome of the entire team.

Pitfall

It’s a common pitfall to start micromanaging your team. Which is of course the most stupid thing to do, and I hope I will be warned and corrected if I ever step into that trap. However, in order to be effective in their personal growth as well as steering to the right outcome, coaching is required on personal as well as content level. In order to be able to do that you’ll need to be aware — at least on a meta level — of what they are doing. Balancing those three aspects (understanding their priorities, fostering personal growth, safety and health and steering on common goals) per team member can be a balancing act of which you are never sure if, or when, one of them will fall due to your inability to cater all of them.

They (the team) are the professionals that I trust. That doesn’t mean that I shouldn’t challenge them or monitor them to become aware of any impediments. This means I have to provide a safe place in which my team can freely speak their minds, and cater healthy peer discussions to establish alignment on various topics. Safety means that we allow one another to be wrong and make mistakes, while maintaining an understanding of the good intent and the person behind it. If you cannot be vulnerable, you’ll have to carry 50 kilo’s of armour with you into each meeting. It’s tiring and completely unnecessary.

T(h)rust vector

I will have to reduce my involvement with projects. But how will I then manage to get to a desired state?

I’ve asked the team what the landscape would look like when they didn’t have to take the state we are in today. All these thoughts were collected into one single document. It was only logical that we still needed alignment on some of these topics, but after a while we’ve managed to produce a document that defines the target state and team vision of where we want to steer towards. The team then aligned on what is needed to attain those goals. By doing so it makes it easier to test if incoming work actually progresses us towards that common goal. If it doesn’t, we shift the balance either in the way we approach the solution or the way we give priority to that goal.

We also keep having healthy discussions on what that goal looks like. No goal should be set in stone because perspectives as well as technology continuously evolve, but I do expect a common and carried vision based on past, current and market knowledge. By continuous and expected re-adjustment of the goals we all remain focussed, informed and engaged with the transformation.

Team first

There is nothing more important in my new role than the health of the individual. This has nothing, as well as everything to do with the company I work at. As a person, I just care for the other person. If you can’t find joy in what you do at work, you shouldn’t do it at all. First you need to be healthy and in a good mental state. Trust me, I’ve been in unhealthy states before (e.g. see the first link in this article) and I can only say that healing is the first and foremost priority for me as a manager of my team.

I don’t say that from the perspective of the company, but from myself. Not as a leader. Not as an employee. Just because I genuinely believe that it’s the only right thing to do.

Secondly, healthy employees with a drive and a passion for what they do are of the utmost relevance for the company. You cannot expect new exciting and innovative solutions for real world challenges to arise from a toxic mindset.

Key Performance Indicators

Of course my management will hold me accountable for the performance of my team. But that’s not what I’m referring to when I talk about these KPIs. I’m talking about: but when do I deem myself successful at what I now do.

That is crucial to remain in a healthy state myself; because when you feel you don’t attribute anything you will soon start letting your head down and feel incompetent.

My KPIs therefore are embedded at different aspects of my responsibility. I deem myself successful if:

• my team and all of its members feel happy and safe doing their job
• I can maintain a good relation to peers and relevant stakeholders that require my teams attention
• have a good overview of the most important matters that my team is addressing, knowing their impediments and enabling them to navigate around them or help them to overcome
• Make sure that all involved are aware of the relevant topics and bring calmness over the team as well as
• Enable a ‘can-do’ mindset, accepting boundaries either set by adversity , wishes or rules and legislation, but maintaining a head-high spirit in order to get the most out of situations we find ourselves in.
• and lastly; see a progression on the roadmap we agreed upon

The last point is critical, in the sense that it should come after the former. Companies meander towards their goals. You can’t influence each decision that’s being made. You can’t steer everything. But by focussing on the former points we remain in the lead to adjust and find other means to get where we want to be.

A boss versus a Leader

Bosses have mandate but without soul. They expect employees to do as they say and be done with it. Anybody can be a boss by being put in a hierarchy. It is never my ambition to be a boss.

Leaders on the other hand are inspiring people you trust and follow. You don’t have to be a boss, to be a leader. Anybody can grow to become a leader, but only by being intrinsically motivated.

If you want to become a manager, first become a leader.

Make sure that you are trusted and are trustworthy. You cannot fake it, nor should you have the ambition to do so. People are wired with a sixth sense for fakeness or ulterior motives. You have to mean it, and mean it without having a hidden agenda behind it. Be a leader, regardless of your rank, regardless of your ambitions. Stand for what you think and speak your mind. Be vulnerable and allow yourself to be wrong in many occasions. I can’t ever operate in synergy with others if there is no foundation for trust. Nor have I the ambition to do so.

Grateful

When my team was informed that I would take position as being their team lead, I was humbled and grateful by the response that I’ve received. Some felt the need to express their doubts with me. Doubts like: since you’ve always addressed your projects with the highest priority, will you appreciate my projects? Or: great that you’ve been able to make the step, but I’m slightly jealous that I couldn’t do the same. I couldn’t wish for more openness and vulnerability than that.

Others immediately responded that they are confident that I will be able to do the job and trust me fully in that new role.

I couldn’t wish for more and hold that memory close. I’m fully aware that it is not a given that such trust is given to someone that has no prior experience in such a setting.

I also feel grateful for the opportunity that my manager has created for me. He — like no other — always had the honest intent to grow me towards my goals. That kind of leadership is rare, and I wish that I manage to do the same for the people that I may lead. Now and in the future.

And last but not least, I am humbled by the IT-MT backed by all it’s stakeholders — and therefore Jumbo’s — choice to stimulate me keep improving myself and help me to grow into this role. I’m not there yet, nor do I have the illusion that I will feel I’ll ever be. But I have confidence that others know I appreciate any feedback so that I can keep evaluating myself and improve.