The Biggest Challenges New Managers Face | Leader Not A Boss 🗣
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New managers often feel overwhelmed by problems around their leadership, but ultimately, it’s almost always the same four underlying issues.
I asked my followers on LinkedIn what they thought was the biggest challenge out of these four common issues. The results were surprising!
Between the top three most common problems, the results were pretty much evenly split. Knowledge gaps are considered much less of a problem, but are still a strong contributing factor to new managers’ struggles.
This week, we’re going to take a close look at each problem, and more importantly, the solutions you need to overcome them. So grab a coffee and let’s dive in!
Competence = Confidence (Most Of The Time)
Confidence does not always go hand in hand with competence - we’ve all known someone who has a surplus of the former and not much of the latter, and the converse also happens fairly often.
But there’s no denying that accidental managers are partly to blame for the prevalence of this problem.
What’s an accidental manager?
Essentially, they got promoted because they were great at their last job… but that didn’t mean they were going to be a great manager.
The skills required in their original role are a very different beast from leadership skills.
This results in a lack of competence, which very quickly results in a lack or loss of confidence – that usually becomes self-fulfilling, and so the cycle continues.
The first step to building confidence is to first build competence, and there’s no magic spell or 5-minute hack for that; it takes practice.
However, if you want to supplement that practice, and get help to recognise mistakes early, adapt quickly, and get the most from the opportunities, working with a leadership coach or mentor could be a great idea.
A coach or mentor gives you the ability to leverage an impartial point of view and benefit from someone else’s experience where your own may be lacking.
Turn And Face The Strange…
When you get promoted within a company, there’s an immediate challenge to handling the transition into management, and you’re likely to find yourself in a position of responsibility over your colleagues and friends.
Your relationships have changed, and this leads to difficult conversations. You need to handle other people’s egos carefully while still establishing your leadership, and ultimately rebuild mutual trust and respect from a new perspective.
This is especially difficult if one of your team also applied for the role you now hold - ouch!
The best solution? Talk, talk, talk.
Don’t hide from those difficult 1-2-1 conversations; aim to have them as early as possible in your leadership journey.
Express your respect for your team and their skills - and while they can’t take the lead entirely, don’t be afraid of building a collaborative and engaged team environment.
Ask for their help in achieving the goals of the team, and listen to what they think are the best ways to do so. Talk to them about expectations; how do they want to be led and treated?
A leadership coach or mentor can help you decide the best approach to take in these conversations, and our Leading with integrity leadership training programmes even offer a framework to help you map them out.
Mind The Knowledge Gap!
There are two aspects to this one:
The Leadership Knowledge Gap
Thanks to the lack of access to leadership training, many new managers end up defaulting to the examples of their own managers, who did the same thing, and so on… no wonder there’s so much outdated authoritarian management going on!
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The Specialist Knowledge Gap
This is common in tech environments. There is often a knowledge gap between the manager - that’s you - and the team of specialists you are likely now responsible for leading.
It’s utterly impossible for any one person to be expert at everything, and you may find yourself leading people towards an outcome when you don’t have a complete understanding of the means to achieve it.
Bridging The Gap
The solution to both of these lies in your understanding of leadership, and how you approach it.
Leading with integrity is specifically built with this in mind – both to give you the knowledge of leadership best practices, and to equip you with the tools and methods to lead people effectively, even when they know the subject matter better than you do.
Who, Me? Dealing With Imposter Syndrome
Imposter syndrome has become somewhat of a buzzword recently, but that doesn’t make it any less real or less challenging.
It gets its claws into leaders at all levels, and it’s often a symptom of our modern, “fake-it-til-you-make it”, social media driven world.
While it can tie in with questions of competence and knowledge as above, imposter syndrome is unique in that it’s all in your head.
I’ve spoken to extremely capable but totally humble leaders who have reached the very top of their industry… and yet behind it all they’re still wracked with self-doubt, feeling unworthy and undeserving of their success.
The bad news is that it may not be possible to ever fully rid yourself of it. It can rear its ugly head again at any time.
The good news is that you can cope with it, manage it, and even lean into it.
It’s nothing to be ashamed of, and it’s a good sign in some ways as it demonstrates your humility, which is an essential aspect of truly great leadership.
Staying humble is extremely important for achieving the kind of authentic, honest leadership that is necessary to build great engagement, trust, and respect with your team.
There are a number of coping strategies that can also help above and beyond what I’ve already mentioned – and again, working with a coach or mentor can be invaluable in helping you adjust your pattern of thinking around this problem.
They’ve likely experienced it themselves, and are well equipped to help you build that combination of self-awareness and self-compassion that can help to keep impostor syndrome at bay.
If This All Seems A Bit Too Close To Home, Don’t Worry…
Remember - these challenges are common among new managers, and you're not alone in facing them.
By focusing on building competence, establishing authentic relationships, closing knowledge gaps, and managing imposter syndrome, you can scale these hurdles and grow as a successful leader.
And if you need some support along the way, our Leading with integrity programme was made for you. I designed it with these exact issues in mind, and I’m right here to help you be the kind of leader you’d want to follow. Drop me a message and I’d be happy to talk you through it.
Otherwise, I’ll see you all next time!
David
If you’d like more insights around similar topics, follow me on LinkedIn and get involved in my regular polls and discussion.
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1yNice bit of work David, clearly much work to do to create the leaders of the future.