In Inception, the dream architect creates the environment in which all players occupy. You also onboard them to new levels, and connect it to the larger mission.
You create and tailor opportunities based on where people want to take their careers. To be a great manager, you need to be a masterful game designer. In game design, you adjust the level of challenge based on the player’s skills to keep them in flow. Increasing motivation is part game design and part dream architect (à la Inception). For those with high task-relevant maturity, your time is better spent asking questions that push their thinking, rather than feeding them answers.
#Tips for first time manager update#
You can infer this based on their actual experience, and update your priors as you observe their work. Someone can be a data wizard but have limited experience making ambiguous decisions. A concept pioneered by Andy Grove, task-relevant maturity refers to how experienced people are at doing the task at hand. Your level of direct involvement should vary based on their task-relevant maturity. Most managers are well-intentioned and are just feeling in the dark. This also works well in reverse: an effective way to manage up is to tell your manager what you need from them or others to succeed. You need to make it clear you’re setting them up for success because you believe in them. Instead, start by staying close to the work, and set that expectation upfront. This belated move tends to damage the person’s self-esteem and reputation with others. Stepping back too soon before someone is ready means they will likely flounder, and you will have to swoop in and help. The biggest mistakes I’ve made are stepping back too soon for fear of annoying the other person, or staying close to the work and not sharing why. Model it, teach it, then coach on an ongoing basis. When you’re training someone to do something they’ve never done before, the simple playbook is: do it once for them, do it once together, then have them do it on their own with your feedback. There are two ways to improve your team’s outcomes: training and motivation. The new reality of being a manager is that your individual outcome no longer matters. We start managing others the way we manage ourselves, but to do better, we need to learn new tools and use them adaptively. :) I’m much better at challenging directly than showing that I care personally because that’s how I treat myself, but I’m slowly inching towards radical candor.
Most managers occupy the less flattering quadrants. It also highlights that you can be both demanding and supportive. By understanding what matters to people, you can deliver feedback in a way that inspires action. Feedback is measured at the ear of the recipient. What’s interesting is that challenging and caring reinforce each other for the better. It’s much easier to pull your punches and not get your message across, or be overly combative if you’re having a bad day. This all sounds very obvious, but striking the right balance in the right situation is surprisingly difficult. Caring personally means showing people you care about them beyond the work they do. A great manager does both, although I think this actually applies to any productive relationship.Ĭhallenging directly means telling people when their work is not good enough and helping them get better. How do you support someone and give them the feedback they need to get better? Kim Scott has a great 2x2 illustrating the balance of challenging directly and caring personally. The defining moments arrive when they get rocky.
Every manager can be a cheerleader when times are rosy. If anything, managers are generally regarded suspiciously. You implicitly trust yourself, but you need to earn it from others. There is a big difference between unlocking high performance in yourself vs. This is preferable when you have a choice in who you manage.
#Tips for first time manager how to#
By managing an earlier version of yourself, you can apply what you’ve already mastered: how to manage yourself. The best way to ease into management is to start by managing someone who is like you. This is my overdue letter with tips for new managers, and to those who find themselves managed by them. I’ve taken many tumbles since I’ve started managing PMs. It’s a classic “what got you here, won’t get you there”. As a manager, you need to pass the torch, and unlearn key habits that helped you succeed in your past life. As an IC, you are rewarded for learning new skills and growing your own contributions. One of the most common ways in which this happens is when strong individual contributors (ICs) get promoted to manager. This phenomenon even has an official name - the Peter principle (sorry, Peter). Here’s a depressing fact: people get promoted to the level of their incompetence.