• Skip to main content
  • Skip to after header navigation
  • Skip to site footer

Sources of Insight

Unleash Your Infinite Potential!

  • ABOUT
  • ARTICLES
    • Latest Articles
    • Personal Development
    • Future Self
    • Emotional Intelligence
    • Happiness
    • Mental Health
    • All Topics
  • BOOKS
  • COURSES
  • RESOURCES
  • CONTACT

8 Questions to Check If You’re on Track as a New Leader

by JD

image

“Obstacles are those frightful things you see when you take your eyes off your goal.” — Henry Ford

Are you on track at work?

Are you focused on the right things and balancing the right priorities?

How do you gauge your progress towards your targets for success?

As a new leader, how do you know whether you’re trending in the right direction?

To improve your personal effectiveness at work, you need to know whether you are on track.

In The First 90 Days: Critical Success Strategies for New Leaders at All Levels, Michael Watkins shares the questions you can use to determine whether you are building momentum or losing your balance.

Key Takeaways

Here are my key takeaways:

  • Know the common traps.  The big traps include using the wrong strategies, failing to adapt to your new situation, and failing to build an effective support network.  Using the questions above can help make sure you cover your bases.
  • Ask questions to common traps.  Use the questions within the core challenges to make sure that you’re setting yourself up for success by avoiding common traps.

Reflection is a powerful way to improve your personal effectiveness.

Through a few key questions, you can quickly assess whether you are on track and correct course if you need to.

8 Questions to Ask Yourself as a New Leader

Watkins provides the following diagnostic questions to serve as your gyroscope for keeping your balance and orientation:

  1. Are you adopting the right mind-set for your new job and letting go of the past? (Promote yourself)
  2. Are you figuring out what you need to learn, from whom to learn it, and how to speed up the learning process? (Accelerate your learning)
  3. Are you diagnosing the type of transition you are facing and the implications for what to do and what not to do? (Match strategy to situation)
  4. Are you focusing on the vital priorities that advance long-term goals and build short-term momentum? (Secure early wins)
  5. Are you building you relationships with your new boss, managing expectations, and marshaling the resources you need? (Negotiate success)
  6. Are you identifying and fixing frustrating misalignments of strategy, structure, systems, and skills? (Achieve alignment)
  7. Are you assessing, restructuring, and aligning your team to leverage what you are trying to accomplish? (Build your team)
  8. Are you building a base of internal and external support for your initiatives so you are not pushing rocks uphill? (Create coalitions)

Remember that knowledge itself isn’t power.  It’s when you apply it and take action that you change your game.

You Might Also Like

5 Conversations to Have with Your Boss
How To Assess Your Portfolio of People, Processes, and Products as a New Leader
How To Avoid Vicious Cycles
How To Build Your Advice-and-Counsel Network
How To Use Structured Reflection to Improve Your Performance
How To Secure Early Wins for New Job Success
Start-ups, Turnarounds, Realignments and Sustaining-Success
STARS Model of Business Evaluation

Category: Book Nuggets, Career, SuccessTag: Books, Career, Effectiveness

About JD

Previous Post:Build Your Personal Board of AdvisersHow To Build Your Advice and Counsel Network
Next Post:10 Success Strategies for New Job Success10 Success Strategies for New Job Success

Sidebar

About the Author

JDI am J.D. Meier. Microsoft 25 years. Join me on a quest for the world's best insight and action for work and life. Learn more...

My Best-Selling Book

This is the book that changes lives ...

Become the greatest version of yourself!

Unleash your greatest potential! Better insights, better results! Learn proven practices for mind, body, emotions, career, finance, relationships, spirituality, and fun.

Growth. Resilience. Strength.

Growth is the art of embracing change, constantly refining our skills, and expanding our potential in a world of endless possibilities. Resilience is our ability to bounce back, turning adversities into opportunities, and leveraging setbacks as powerful lessons. Strength is the foundation, rooted in our values and beliefs, that empowers us to navigate challenges and shape our unique path forward.

Stand on the Shoulders of Giants!

Stand on the shoulders of giants and awaken your greatness. Leverage wisdom of the ages and modern sages to explore and expand what you’re capable of. Draw from great books, great people, and great quotes to be more and achieve more.

Topics

  • All Topics
  • Personal Development
  • Future Self
  • Emotional Intelligence
  • Leadership
  • Personal Effectiveness
  • Productivity
  • Mental Health

Features

  • Featured Guests
  • Book Summaries
  • Books I Recommend
  • Great Lessons
  • Great Quotes
  • How Tos
  • Lists
  • Products I Recommend
  • All Resources

My Other Sites

  • JD Meier.com
  • Getting Results.com

Copyright © 2023 · Sources of Insight · All Rights Reserved