Leveraging Operations in Leadership
Welcome to Leveraging Operations in Leadership, the podcast that helps leaders build high‑performing teams by bridging the gap between leadership development and operational excellence.
In each episode, we'll dive deep into operational strategies and tactics designed to help you create a high-performance environment. From effective planning and streamlined processes to robust leadership development, we'll cover everything you need to know to inspire and manage your team with confidence.
Our mission is to equip you with the tools and insights necessary to avoid burnout while fostering a culture of excellence and innovation. Whether you're a first-time manager or a seasoned leader looking to sharpen your skills, this podcast is your go-to resource for mastering the art of team leadership.
Join us on this journey to elevate your leadership game and achieve outstanding results with your team.
Leveraging Operations in Leadership
Promotion Is Not Preparation: Avoid the 60% Failure Trap
So, you got promoted — now what?
If you’ve stepped into a leadership role and thought, “Why didn’t anyone prepare me for this?” - you’re not alone. In fact, research shows that 60% of new leaders fail within their first 18 months. Not because they’re not capable, but because they weren’t equipped.
In this episode of Leveraging Operations in Leadership, we’re digging into what really happens after the promotion. Because the truth is, promotion and preparation are not the same thing.
Whether you're leading your first team or trying to get your footing after a big step up, this episode will help you shift from just surviving leadership to leading with clarity and confidence.
Ready to lead with more confidence and less overwhelm?
Check out The Leadership Shift Coaching - a powerful coaching experience to help you lead your team with purpose, clarity, and intention. 👉🏾 https://go.cignalpartners.com/leadershipshift
Hey there and welcome back to Leveraging Operations in Leadership, the podcast that helps leaders build high-performing teams by bridging the gap between leadership development and operational excellence, between leadership development and operational excellence. Did you know that 60% of new managers fail within their first 24 months in the role? That is, more than half of the people that are promoted into management role actually fail within 24 months. It has nothing to do with how driven they are, how smart they are or how capable they are. It's because many organizations promote high-performing individual contributors into management roles without giving them the tools to succeed. Giving them the tools to succeed. They're expected to lead with no roadmap, no feedback, no training, no support. Today we're talking about why that transition is so hard and what you can do to avoid becoming part of the 60%. Because here's the truth the skills that got you promoted as an individual contributor are not the same skills that will help you succeed as a manager. In fact, if you try to lead by leaning on your old habits, you are likely to burn out and take your team with you. Let's talk about the five critical skills every manager needs to develop, how they differ from what worked in the last role and how to build them intentionally. In your new role as an individual contributor, your job was to deliver results and manage your workload and deadlines. You were likely rewarded for being fast and efficient, independent, great execution all of the good stuff. But once you become a manager, the rules of the game actually change. Your success is now measured by how well your team performs, whether your people are growing, if your projects are aligned with business goals and if your team is running smoothly, with or without you.
Speaker 1:This transition requires a shift in mindset, habits and skills, so let's break down the five skills that separate strong managers from overwhelmed ones. The first skill set on the list is communication. Leadership. Communication means being able to align your team around goals, giving clear directions, offering timely and consistent feedback and being able to manage up, down and across. This is important because poor communication leads to confusion, delays, disengagement, rework, overwhelm teams and teams that are not as engaged. As a manager, your job is to create clarity and connection, not just pass along information. You want to make sure that you have a communication cadence or plan in order to help you through this process. Here's a stat for you Up to 57% of managers don't give clear direction Again, more than half and 51% don't communicate with their team consistently. This is where a lot of breakdowns happen, a lot of chaos happens, and it is avoidable, but you have to know how to put some of these things in place.
Speaker 1:The second skill set that you want to get really good at. The second skill you want to develop is delegation. When we're talking about burnout right, this is something that will burn you out quickly. Again, as an individual contributor, you are responsible for doing the work. That's not the case, right? So when we're talking about delegation, this is the ability to assign tasks, responsibilities and decision making authority in a way that builds trust and accountability, without micromanaging. Your job is no longer to do everything, but what we find is important, as the skill set is, is that many of the managers more than 50% of managers feel stressed and overwhelmed, and is largely because they struggle to delegate effectively. If you can get this skill, if you can really sharpen it and hone this skill, you are going to be less stressed. So, as a manager, remember, your job is no longer to do it all yourself. Delegation frees you up to focus on leadership while helping your team right, empowering your team and helping them to stretch and grow and own their work. It's also about accountability, and it also protects your capacity and your mental health. Focus on distributing the work and coaching through it.
Speaker 1:The third skill is prioritization and planning. Prioritization is the ability to determine what matters most, being able to align your team accordingly and manage time and energy accordingly. Intentionally, things can get away from you really quickly. You definitely want to make sure that you keep things prioritized. Everything can't be urgent. Everything can't be urgent. We have to be able to define priorities. If you're not able to define the priorities for your team, then your team will burn out because they're trying to do it all and then, on top of that, not only will they burn out, but then they'll still end up missing the mark, and it's really not their fault. If you are unable to determine what your priorities are, then this is an opportunity to sit with the person you report to and redefine what the priorities are for you and your team. You want to make sure that you are putting forth maximum effort in working on the things that actually matter and things that align with your manager's goals and with the organization's goals and direction. Keep in mind you're no longer just prioritizing your own tasks. Now you have to balance priorities across people, projects and strategic goals.
Speaker 1:The fourth skill to develop is coaching. Skill to develop is coaching. Coaching is helping others develop their thinking, solve their own problems and grow into stronger contributors. You want them to be a strong contributor, like you were. That's what got you promoted. Coaching creates autonomy. They're able to do things on their own. It creates trust and long-term performance. It also keeps you from becoming the person everyone depends on for every decision. In essence, it stops you from being the bottleneck where everything has to go through you and every decision has to go through you and every question comes to you. You don't want to be the bottleneck. You want to empower your team and you're going to do this through coaching.
Speaker 1:And one of the challenges is that many new managers default to giving answers or fixing problems, not developing people, and that's because it's easier. If someone comes and they ask you a question, it's easier just to give them the answer, whereas coaching requires patience. You have to have active listening and you have to have strong questions, not just solutions, and you want to coach them through how to resolve these things. And then what happens is, once you help them through this, now they know how to do it. They're not dependent on you all the time for this. So you know before where you were used to solving all of the problems. Now you want to develop the person solving the problem.
Speaker 1:The last skill I want to share with you is strategic thinking. This one takes a while sometimes. Strategic thinking is seeing the big picture. It's going to require that you get up out of the weeds, that you get up out of the low level day to day, so that you can see the big picture and you can anticipate the needs of your team and align your team's work with business priorities. Remember, you're not just managing tasks, you're shaping outcomes. The further you go up, the more your value is tied to your ability to think and act strategically and to lead through others. Managers who lack strategic thinking tend to stay stuck in the day-to-day weeds. They end up missing opportunities and fail to earn the trust of senior leadership.
Speaker 1:One of the key things that differ between when you were an individual contributor and now is before, you were focused on execution. Before you were focused on execution. Now you're looking at impact and value. So those are the skills right. So that's all well and fine, but how do you get started with actually developing these skills. Let's talk about five steps that you can take right now to start developing each of these skills. The first thing you want to do is do a self-assessment Kind of talk about this in another podcast, but you want to really be true with yourself and list out these skills and identify which ones you're struggling in Be honest. You could even ask your team for feedback, your peers for feedback and your manager, the person that you report to for feedback. You want honest feedback. You want to know what your baseline is, where it is that you're starting and you grow from there.
Speaker 1:And then step number two is to think about your role differently. You want to reframe your role. Here's something that you could say my value is no longer in how much I get done. It's in how well I lead others to get the right things done. I'm pausing so you can really get that and think about it. My value is no longer in how much I get done. It's in how well I lead others to get the right things done, and this is extremely important when you're managing people.
Speaker 1:Step number three you want to learn and apply. You can listen to podcasts like this one. You can read leadership books. You can join training programs like the lead ops, but don't stop at knowing. Once you get the information, you have to apply it one skill at a time. Practice is the path You're going to learn and apply, learn and apply. So just think about information and implementation.
Speaker 1:The fourth step is to create feedback loops. As you're applying this information, you want to know how well you're doing Having regular one-on-ones. You can ask your team what's working, what's not working, ask them how you can support them better. You can ask your manager for feedback on how well you're leading. You can again, you can ask your peers. If you have people that you can get truthful feedback from, you can ask them. So you want to definitely create feedback loops because you're doing all of this work, you're putting this out there. You want to know if it's really working or not.
Speaker 1:And the fifth step is to stay coachable. Leadership is a craft. You're not going to master it within 30 days. But stay curious, stay humble, stay consistent and you will grow faster than most and you will make sure that you're not a part of the 60%. So, in closing, you were promoted because of your strengths, but your success as a manager depends on your ability to build new ones, and the truth is 60% of new managers fail. Only 19% excel at delegation and most get little to no formal training. But that doesn't have to be your story. You can change the game. If this episode resonated, be sure to share it with someone who's navigating this transition or who needs to hear that they're not alone. And if you're ready to get intentional about developing your skills, you can check out the Lead Outs program, a 90-day leadership experience designed to help you lead with clarity, build a strategy and grow with confidence. Until next time, keep your leadership in action and your operations in motion.
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