5 tips for the newly made department head
I want to share 5 important, in my opinion, things that should be recognized by a specialist who suddenly becomes the head of his department. This is more of a farewell, a psychological pump than concrete methods, but it seems to me that career changes are the moment for internal changes. I myself was lucky to become the head of a new department, created from employees engaged in a certain area, and this is what I managed to figure out for myself.
Your position is not valuable - your contribution to the business is valuable while you are in that position. Clinging to a place, no matter what benefits it brings, is destructive for your personality and career.
You may find it very lucky that you have been made a leader. Good luck, comparable to winning the lottery, good luck that you need to grab and hold as soon as possible. This is a wrong position: your boss is not an idiot, he chose you to this place for your qualities, and not by the method of scientific poking. (If your boss is an idiot, it’s also quite difficult to consider luck - run away from there sooner). Your qualities are inconsistent, as well as circumstances outside, and the boss can just as well decide to remove you from this position.
There will be times when you will hate your chair and all those tedious and heavy duties that are attached to it. Your leadership position is just a stage in your life, just like any other. If your wife is pregnant, you will not begin to hope that she is like another year or two with this cute belly - on the contrary, you will make every effort so that the pregnancy ends successfully and on time, no matter how long it may seem. The same thing with work - no matter how pleasant the very fact of moving to a leadership position is, trying to stay there for the sake of the fact itself is stupid, but trying to bring maximum benefit is right.
In turn, resigning from a managerial position is not a disaster if you are sure that you did everything right. If you are the same worthwhile specialist as you were, you will not be lost or lost.
Having headed the department, you, of course, are responsible for its effective work. But it will be a big mistake to systematically provide this effectiveness with personal efforts.
Yes, most likely, you have been selected for the role of leader because of your vast experience and skills. And now your task is not to apply these skills personally, but to make sure that they are in the same volume with as many of your employees as possible.
The head of the transport department does not personally deliver customers to the bottling directly to the fitting. He makes sure that the drivers of Larionov and Kutko do not forget about their work.
The main mistake of the newly made leader will be to do everything that is necessary and as it should for his employees in silence. You really can and should apply your skills and experience for direct participation in difficult situations, but first of all, the situation should be such that your employee can no longer cope and probably will not cope in the next attempt, and that's why you intervene. The employee must find out what exactly went wrong and how to find it the next time, as well as what needs to be done in such a situation and why, and what the result will be. Before his eyes you must demonstrate this predictable result - this is the only way to achieve authority.
In all other situations, believe: if you know exactly how to perform this or that ordinary operation best, the employee can be entrusted with its implementation (if possible without valuable instructions on your part). He will either cope or not - and then you can prove yourself as a good boss, not an ordinary employee.
IT employees are especially characteristic of people around them, like computers made of meat. The computer is designed so that when you give it the same program, it produces the same result. The guys in sweaters tend to expect the same from people, but a person is a living creature, living in its inconsistency (and if we hadn’t this property, you would personally have soiled your diapers, and not read this article).
Your employees will misinterpret your instructions, show different ability to work on different days, get sick, quarrel, be lazy, change their occupation, mow and not get enough sleep. These are living people, and this is the element base with which you will soon have to work. It will not work to ignore these superpowers of people - you will have to work directly with each fact of such manifestations, otherwise your department is at risk. Try to accept and, if possible, love this new aspect of your work.
It is for you, and not someone else, to have to deal with the personal problems of your employees, to give or not to leave someone off, to scold someone (personally, in the eyes) for jambs and shortcomings, to praise someone (with all honesty people) for good work, sorting out quarrels and complaints, assigning weekends and working days (as well as how long we work on December 31 - and whether we work at all), congratulating on birthdays and weddings, dismissing - in general, all personnel work is now yours. Find out in advance how all these issues are resolved in your company. Think about whether these things went well while you were not yet a leader - if something could be done better, then here it is, your chance to prove yourself. And don’t expect that people will be able to drum the whole working routine for eight hours every day, even if you have taught everyone how to do it.
To reduce the impact of the human factor on the work of your department, regularly think about automation of routine operations.
Your boss will be interested in how things are going, and you yourself too. Working in a managerial position will put your memory to severe trials - even if you are sure that it did not fail you before, now it is time to find backup options for storing facts.
Verbal agreement is not enough. Even if you talked with someone and agreed exactly, and you both remember exactly what you agreed on, still send an email with the exact wording you could agree on. Be manic consistent with this technique especially when talking to superiors. We talked - realized - email.
If you have considered something important for yourself, send an email about the results to yourself. If an emergency happened - it will be correct if it is reflected in the relevant magazines, bugtrackers, wikis, and so on. Well, or at least in the form of an email to myself. And in general, start keeping a diary of your department - what happened over the past day, week, month, why it is important. Six months later, you will say thank you.
Sooner or later they will require reporting from you - think about which numbers serve as indicators of your work, with the help of which indicators you can see problems in the department. As a person’s temperature: if it’s above 37 degrees, it means it’s sick, if it’s below 30 or above 42, he died. Now think about what you can measure in your work to identify dangerous trends. Start collecting these numbers, even if no one is demanding this from you yet - it’s better to be able to provide them than to sit on a sudden report all night with burning pants on. Read what KPI is.
Yes, this is unpleasant, but bureaucracy is now part of your work, your personal responsibility. Again, it can be placed on the shoulders of automation, if you yourself know well what and how to write and count. Spare a few hours on automation to save yourself days. Part of these responsibilities can be assigned to your employees, but just think about how much bureaucracy you would have endured as an employee - and do your best not to exceed this threshold.
No matter how good a leader you dream of becoming, you are still as good as you can judge from your department. Things are important, not intentions. Nobody cares what you wanted to do there, what you thought sleepless nights, what trainings and seminars you attended, what book you read and the video you watched. Read at least everything in the world, but while you are not doing anything with your department or doing something wrong, your work on yourself is equivalent to a root of minus one.
If fear holds you back, remember that fear is not what is expected of you here. Everyone and everyone is scared, and the leader is you. And you decide. A solid decision is your main product at this place. You can be wrong - and then the reporting system and the careful attitude of the leadership towards you will not allow the error to cause too much damage. Over time, you will learn to look at the root of the reasons that led you to certain decisions, and to work out the right decisions systematically (even if you make them by tossing a coin).
But if you hesitate, hide problems, move away from solutions - you are working against yourself and no one will help you.
That's all. I sincerely wish you good luck and prudence.
Do not value your place
Your position is not valuable - your contribution to the business is valuable while you are in that position. Clinging to a place, no matter what benefits it brings, is destructive for your personality and career.
You may find it very lucky that you have been made a leader. Good luck, comparable to winning the lottery, good luck that you need to grab and hold as soon as possible. This is a wrong position: your boss is not an idiot, he chose you to this place for your qualities, and not by the method of scientific poking. (If your boss is an idiot, it’s also quite difficult to consider luck - run away from there sooner). Your qualities are inconsistent, as well as circumstances outside, and the boss can just as well decide to remove you from this position.
There will be times when you will hate your chair and all those tedious and heavy duties that are attached to it. Your leadership position is just a stage in your life, just like any other. If your wife is pregnant, you will not begin to hope that she is like another year or two with this cute belly - on the contrary, you will make every effort so that the pregnancy ends successfully and on time, no matter how long it may seem. The same thing with work - no matter how pleasant the very fact of moving to a leadership position is, trying to stay there for the sake of the fact itself is stupid, but trying to bring maximum benefit is right.
In turn, resigning from a managerial position is not a disaster if you are sure that you did everything right. If you are the same worthwhile specialist as you were, you will not be lost or lost.
Say how to do, not do.
Having headed the department, you, of course, are responsible for its effective work. But it will be a big mistake to systematically provide this effectiveness with personal efforts.
Yes, most likely, you have been selected for the role of leader because of your vast experience and skills. And now your task is not to apply these skills personally, but to make sure that they are in the same volume with as many of your employees as possible.
The head of the transport department does not personally deliver customers to the bottling directly to the fitting. He makes sure that the drivers of Larionov and Kutko do not forget about their work.
The main mistake of the newly made leader will be to do everything that is necessary and as it should for his employees in silence. You really can and should apply your skills and experience for direct participation in difficult situations, but first of all, the situation should be such that your employee can no longer cope and probably will not cope in the next attempt, and that's why you intervene. The employee must find out what exactly went wrong and how to find it the next time, as well as what needs to be done in such a situation and why, and what the result will be. Before his eyes you must demonstrate this predictable result - this is the only way to achieve authority.
In all other situations, believe: if you know exactly how to perform this or that ordinary operation best, the employee can be entrusted with its implementation (if possible without valuable instructions on your part). He will either cope or not - and then you can prove yourself as a good boss, not an ordinary employee.
People are not cars
IT employees are especially characteristic of people around them, like computers made of meat. The computer is designed so that when you give it the same program, it produces the same result. The guys in sweaters tend to expect the same from people, but a person is a living creature, living in its inconsistency (and if we hadn’t this property, you would personally have soiled your diapers, and not read this article).
Your employees will misinterpret your instructions, show different ability to work on different days, get sick, quarrel, be lazy, change their occupation, mow and not get enough sleep. These are living people, and this is the element base with which you will soon have to work. It will not work to ignore these superpowers of people - you will have to work directly with each fact of such manifestations, otherwise your department is at risk. Try to accept and, if possible, love this new aspect of your work.
It is for you, and not someone else, to have to deal with the personal problems of your employees, to give or not to leave someone off, to scold someone (personally, in the eyes) for jambs and shortcomings, to praise someone (with all honesty people) for good work, sorting out quarrels and complaints, assigning weekends and working days (as well as how long we work on December 31 - and whether we work at all), congratulating on birthdays and weddings, dismissing - in general, all personnel work is now yours. Find out in advance how all these issues are resolved in your company. Think about whether these things went well while you were not yet a leader - if something could be done better, then here it is, your chance to prove yourself. And don’t expect that people will be able to drum the whole working routine for eight hours every day, even if you have taught everyone how to do it.
To reduce the impact of the human factor on the work of your department, regularly think about automation of routine operations.
Count. Write it down. Keep.
Your boss will be interested in how things are going, and you yourself too. Working in a managerial position will put your memory to severe trials - even if you are sure that it did not fail you before, now it is time to find backup options for storing facts.
Verbal agreement is not enough. Even if you talked with someone and agreed exactly, and you both remember exactly what you agreed on, still send an email with the exact wording you could agree on. Be manic consistent with this technique especially when talking to superiors. We talked - realized - email.
If you have considered something important for yourself, send an email about the results to yourself. If an emergency happened - it will be correct if it is reflected in the relevant magazines, bugtrackers, wikis, and so on. Well, or at least in the form of an email to myself. And in general, start keeping a diary of your department - what happened over the past day, week, month, why it is important. Six months later, you will say thank you.
Sooner or later they will require reporting from you - think about which numbers serve as indicators of your work, with the help of which indicators you can see problems in the department. As a person’s temperature: if it’s above 37 degrees, it means it’s sick, if it’s below 30 or above 42, he died. Now think about what you can measure in your work to identify dangerous trends. Start collecting these numbers, even if no one is demanding this from you yet - it’s better to be able to provide them than to sit on a sudden report all night with burning pants on. Read what KPI is.
Yes, this is unpleasant, but bureaucracy is now part of your work, your personal responsibility. Again, it can be placed on the shoulders of automation, if you yourself know well what and how to write and count. Spare a few hours on automation to save yourself days. Part of these responsibilities can be assigned to your employees, but just think about how much bureaucracy you would have endured as an employee - and do your best not to exceed this threshold.
“Do not try to hit, but hit.”
No matter how good a leader you dream of becoming, you are still as good as you can judge from your department. Things are important, not intentions. Nobody cares what you wanted to do there, what you thought sleepless nights, what trainings and seminars you attended, what book you read and the video you watched. Read at least everything in the world, but while you are not doing anything with your department or doing something wrong, your work on yourself is equivalent to a root of minus one.
If fear holds you back, remember that fear is not what is expected of you here. Everyone and everyone is scared, and the leader is you. And you decide. A solid decision is your main product at this place. You can be wrong - and then the reporting system and the careful attitude of the leadership towards you will not allow the error to cause too much damage. Over time, you will learn to look at the root of the reasons that led you to certain decisions, and to work out the right decisions systematically (even if you make them by tossing a coin).
But if you hesitate, hide problems, move away from solutions - you are working against yourself and no one will help you.
That's all. I sincerely wish you good luck and prudence.