What New Team Leaders Should Do First

Important: GDPR Email Preferences

As you may already know, the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) will be coming into effect on 25th May 2018. We take your privacy seriously and we are working hard to ensure we comply with the new data protection laws. You can find out more about how we're doing this in our privacy policy on our website.

We want to make sure you continue to receive the latest newsletters, blogs, special offers and more.

As someone who has opted-in to receive our emails in the past, we’d like to give you this opportunity to confirm what you wish to receive:

Just so you know, if you don’t let us know what kinds of emails you want to receive from us, we’ll stop emailing you on the 24th May 2018 - you'll be missing out!

You are of course free to change your mind at any time – just follow the link at the bottom of any of our emails.

What New Team Leaders Should Do First

To make a success of their new role, the first things a new team leader should do are:

1. Learn the current set-up.
2. Discover the team's goal.
3. Find out what the current plan is.
4. Integrate yourself into the team.
5. Look for ways to improve the current set up.
6. Make it your mission to continually improve upon the current situation.

1. Learn the current setup.

Don't try to impress everyone on your first day. Introduce yourself to other members of the team. Keep your eyes and ears open and take written notes.

Discover the current setup:

• Who is who?
• What do they do?
• What is working well and what is not so successful?

2. Discover the team's goal.

Organisations and teams exist to achieve goals.

Therefore, you must discover the goals of the organisation. What is it trying to achieve and why?

It is vital you learn this information.

Find the most influential people in the organisation and ask them those questions, write down and memorise their answers.

3. Find out what the current plan is.

Every goal needs a plan for its achievement.

You need to know how the organisation or team, currently intends to achieve its goals.

Ask the more senior members of the organisation to gain a detailed understanding of the plans, both strategic long range, and tactical short range.

Draw a sketch of the plan, and try to understand as much as you can.

4. Integrate yourself into the team.

When making acquaintance with the other members of the team, be friendly, inquisitive, and respectful to everyone and don't make waves.

Don't try to be funny.

Take in more information than you give out.

Don't brag about your past accomplishments.

Just integrate yourself into the current setup, with as little fuss and fanfare as possible.

5. Look for ways to improve upon the current set up.

When you feel fully absorbed into the team, then start to think about how you can improve upon the current working methods.

There must be things that you can see are not right, something not working as well as it could be.

Find out how they can be improved.

When you discover a fixable error, or an opportunity to improve the current working practice, put your plan in writing and present it to the team member who can benefit by the improvement.

6. Continually strive to improve upon the current setup.

The world changes by the hour, and what was working well last year, may be less efficient this year.

Never be satisfied with the current setup.

Assume the mantra: "Improvement is always possible."

Continually look for ways to improve upon the current situation.

Train yourself to be a better team-leader manager.

Develop your team to give your their best performance.

If you continually strive to make things better, then your future is assured.

Blogs by Email

Do you want to receive an email whenever we post a new blog? The blogs contain article 5-10 minutes long - ideal for reading during your coffee break!

Your Comments

Further Reading in Leadership and Management

• Leadership qualities: self control
  Leadership qualities: self control Many organisations are interested in developing some of their people into future leaders; so many organisations are interested in identifying potential leaders; which are those people who show good promise and will be worthy of further investment. Organisations need to identify those people who have leadership qualities...
  Read Article >
• Leadership and management development Part 3 of 6
  Time management, planning ahead This six part essay covers the six major themes of leadership and management development. The six themes are as follows. Your leadership and management development programme needs to be centered around the six essential leadership management skills, namely the ability: To set and...
  Read Article >
• Management Skills: Continuous Improvement
  Continuous improvement is about always striving to make things better. Every day, strive to make things just a little better than they are now. Small improvements will become significant in time.
  Read Article >
• Mummy, Mummy. Look at me!
  Kids will do anything to gain approval. Unfortunately, so will some grown-ups. Managers in the business world, need to learn that doing the most popular thing is NOT always the same as doing the RIGHT thing.
  Read Article >
• Management Skills for New Managers
  Management Skills for New Managers Training for the new manager is important because they are often facing a unique set of problems; The new managers are often trying to manage people who have always known them as a NON manager, so the new manager needs to earn the respect of team...
  Read Article >

Advert