The First 90 Days (4 page)

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As long as there have been leaders, there have been leadership transitions. The changing of the guard and the challenges it poses for the new leader are as old as human society. Those challenges have not gotten any easier given the complexity of modern organizations and the speed at which business gets conducted. So if you feel that you are in over your head in your new position, you are in good company.

This book is your road map for taking charge in your first 90 days in a new job. Why do you need it? Because transitions are critical times when small differences in your actions can have disproportionate impacts on results.

Leaders, regardless of their level, are most vulnerable in their first few months in a new position because they lack detailed knowledge of the challenges they will face and what it will take to succeed in meeting them; they also have not yet developed a network of relationships to sustain them. Failure to create momentum during the first few months virtually guarantees an uphill battle for the rest of your tenure in the job. Building credibility and securing some early wins lay a firm foundation for longer-term success.

The transition acceleration model presented in this book extends the work that I did with Dan Ciampa when we wrote
Right from the Start
(Boston: Harvard Business School Press, 1999). I was proud of that work, but I also came away wanting to advance it on several fronts. First, I was convinced that leaders at all levels could benefit from guidance on how to accelerate their transitions into new positions.
Right from the Start
was addressed chiefly to top executives. So although much of its advice was general, it wasn’t clear which points were relevant to all transitions and which were specific to the challenges facing senior executives. I wanted to create a more flexible framework for transition acceleration, one that would help leaders at every level. At the same time, I wanted to address some important topics in more depth, such as working with the new boss, building the team, and aligning the organization’s strategy, structure, systems, and skills.

In tandem with this, I wanted to delve deeper into different
types of transitions,
to help new leaders better tailor their strategies to the details of their situations. It matters a great deal, for example, whether you are leading a start-up or taking on a turnaround or inheriting a high-performing unit. Furthermore, leaders entering new organizations face different challenges from those who are promoted from within. Transition strategy thus depends on the situation.

Finally, I wanted to explore the organizational implications of systematic attention to transition acceleration. I was struck by how few companies invested in helping their precious leadership assets succeed during transitions—arguably the most critical junctures in their careers. Why did companies leave their people to sink or swim? What would it be worth to companies if managers entering critical new positions could take charge faster?

For three years, I have explored these issues by studying dozens of leadership transitions at all levels, by designing transition acceleration programs for leading companies, and by developing an online performance-support tool for new leaders. That work has culminated in the writing of this book.

If you are reading this, you likely are transitioning into a new role. This book will equip you with strategies and tools to get up to speed faster and to achieve more, sooner. You will learn how to diagnose your situation and gain clarity about its challenges and opportunities. You will assess your strengths and weaknesses and identify your greatest personal vulnerabilities in your new situation. You will gain insight into how to learn about a new organization and establish your priorities more quickly. You will learn how to diagnose and align the strategy, structure, systems, and skills of your new organization. Perhaps most important, you will get solid advice about how to manage key relationships to leverage yourself—by building teams, creating coalitions, and recruiting a supportive network of advisers and counselors. Use this book as a road map for creating your 90-day plan. If you do, you will get up to speed, and help others do so, faster than you thought possible.

Michael Watkins

Boston

This book is dedicated to my
Right from the Start
coauthor, Dan Ciampa. It was Dan who got me interested in leadership transitions. He contributed many important ideas and vivid examples to the book we wrote together and

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thus to the conceptual foundation on which this book rests. Dan’s deep understanding of the challenges that face managers when they enter new seniorlevel positions continues to enrich my thinking. Dan is a gifted counselor of leaders and a good friend.

The First 90 Days
is also an outgrowth of my work with Johnson & Johnson. Inaki Bastarrika, formerly of J&J’s Management Education and Development (MED) department, convinced me to work with this excellent company in 1999 just after the publication of
Right from the Start
, launching a rewarding research partnership. Ron Bossert, a director of MED, was instrumental in developing the J&J Transition Leadership Forum and the Business Leaders’

Program for the company’s new business unit leaders. Ron also introduced me to leaders whose support was crucial, including Sharon D’Agnostino, Bill Dearstyne, Mike Dormer, Colleen Goggins, Jim Lenahan, Dennis Longstreet, Bill McComb, Pat Mutchler, Christine Poon, Peter Tattle, and Bill Weldon. Thanks also to the high-potential leaders at J&J

who energetically took part in the programs I taught there.

This book is intended to complement the Leadership Transitions online performance-support tool that I developed in partnership with Harvard Business School Publishing (HBSP). The experience of creating a Web-based support tool for new leaders unquestionably helped sharpen my thinking about transition issues. Heartfelt thanks to the e-learning group at HBSP, and especially to Michelle Barton, Sarah Cummins, Ian Fanton, and Trisytn Patrick, for making that project such a pleasure to work on.

The Division of Research at the Harvard Business School funded the research that forms the foundation of this book.

The support provided by research directors Teresa Amabile and Kathleen McGinn is very much appreciated. This book, and my work more broadly, would not have been possible without the encouragement provided by members of the Negotiation, Organizations, and Markets unit at HBS, especially George Baker, Max Bazerman, Nancy Beaulieu, Mal Salter, Jim Sebenius, and Michael Wheeler. Thanks too to Jack Gabarro and Linda Hill, colleagues whose ideas significantly influenced my thinking about leadership transitions.

Finally, many thanks to my faculty assistant, Mary Alice Wood; my research assistant, Usha Thakrar; and my editor, Ann Goodsell, for their help in making this book a reality.