WORKING WITH A NEW BOSS

People spend more time thinking about how to work and be close with their bosses than any other business relationship (often times more than the customers or clients who are supposed to be ‘the king’); still they manage to get the relationship very wrong. Instead of making their careers, the relationship actually breaks it.

 Even if you have had a sour or not so-good relationship with your former boss, a new boss is an opportunity to get it right, and begin a rise to the top of your career. If you want a good relationship with your new boss, here are some useful tips:

1.  Be loyal: Disloyalty is an unforgiveable character flaw and you cannot and will not be trusted. People that cannot be trusted by their bosses cannot be recommended for promotions or even assigned any special duty or responsibility. This is because loyalty is more important than competence. Samuel Godwyn once said that he will take fifty percent efficiency to get one hundred percent loyalty. Loyalty shown publicly also results in leverage privately; when the decisions that will bring about your promotion in the office are made, they are usually in private when you are not there, and the truth is, people always want their own man on the top job.
2.   Keep the boss informed: No one has ever lost a job because they told the boss too much. Do so till he says stop. This quality is known as communication skills, and it is a major quality that everyone that must rise to the top of their career must possess. Your communication with your boss doesn’t have to be formal always, sometimes, it is better to make it tactfully natural; a good sense of humor but don’t tell unkind stories and silly jokes. Keep your mails and texts well-crafted too; this is a way of positively selling yourself.
3. Embrace changes instigated by your new boss: The ambition of every new boss is to bring change. Sometimes, they don’t even know what change or how to go about it; they want to make a change anyways but please dear reader, just make sure you are not resisting change that is instigated by your new boss, especially if it is not part of your job to do so. Helping the new boss in driving change to the organization, whether or not he is coming from the organization is very important for a career-building relationship with your boss. You can help by supplying useful information and resources. You can do this by mailing him useful materials you find online or linking him with people you know can help him achieve his goal for those few that have one and a strategy.
4.   Respect the boss’s time: If you need thirty minutes with him, don’t take sixty, better yet take twenty. The truth is, the more time you spend talking with your boss, the more you give him chance to weigh you and rate you, which is not very good for you because he might realize things he naturally does not like about your person. No need for irrelevant talk.
5.     Don’t tread his turf: ‘oga’ stay on your lane. He must give you permission if you must enter his lane. Treading the turf of a new boss especially when he has a superior or superiors he has to impress is ‘dan-ge-rous’. This is not to say that you should become a robot or you should not be proactive, what I am simply saying is that even if you are the next in line in authority, let him exercise his authority every time.
6.      Deliver in time: I always teach people that work with me in any organization my personal work strategy, “please deliver remarkable results in the shortest possible time”. Bosses don’t pull out a stop watch when they assign a task to you, but their internal clock is ticking. When you are competent, you will n0t have to do so much to win the love and trust of your new boss. Competence makes the office assistant closer to the new boss than even his assistant.
7.  Pray without ceasing: Funny isn’t it? I have learnt from experience and by studying very hard about relationships; I tell you the truth, when you pray, your mind is conditioned to function better and relate better with God and man. As much as many people will not like to consider this point very important, you must know that you have not done anything about any situation until you have prayed about it. This point is something I wish we could exhaust in this article, but E.M Bounds has written a very good book on this topic called ‘The possibilities of prayer’ and I recommend the book for you.                                                                                                                                                                                              If I was to write one more point, it will be the most important part of the article, and that is for you, my reader to be careful to observe to practice the seven points above. There is so much value in information, but the reward of applying knowledge is priceless.

BEING THE NEW CEO- PART 2 (THE FIRST MEETING)

Now you are the CEO, you decide whether this will be trouble for you, or another feather to your cap. A lot of people usually allow their over excitement to destroy their future in the new position of CEO. I usually advice my clients not to hurry into calling a meeting upon appointment; that is dangerous! You need to take time to allow the over excitement wear out, especially if the appointment or promotion is a long expected one. The problem with entering your first meeting with your team or staff still overexcited is that you might make a lot of mistakes that will cost you that position; over excitement kills at times.

To help you make the better of your first meeting, I have these tips.

DON’T DO.

• · Don’t let them measure you:

People can determine your worth, or weight from the words you say, don’t give them that privilege sir; don’t give them that privilege ma; not on the first meeting you are having with them, no, please, not on the first meeting. A leader that will succeed must first of all seek to understand his team, before he seeks to be understood. In your first meeting, the team should do more of the talking. Don’t go into that meeting telling them about yourself and how you want things to be done. You will need to do that ok, but not on the first meeting. To achieve this, you need to keep the meeting short: be introduced and have everyone introduce themselves, then they can share their experiences working in that organization. Period

• ·         Don’t talk about change first:

Change is scary at first, so don’t try to sell them the idea or your dream of changing things in the first meeting. Oh my dear friend, please don’t.  You need to make them feel relaxed on your first meeting. It is better to make them know that you are willing to learn from them and work with them. That is how to make a success out of your first staff or team meeting

• ·         Don’t sell yourself cheaply:

First impressions matter, but first impressions don’t have to be made on your first meeting. By avoiding making impressions on your first meeting, you maintain a level of unpredictability, which is sometimes good for you as the new CEO to buy you enough time to settle down and at the same time, not lose value or respect of your team. Some people in their first meeting, try to make good impressions on their team or staff, make promises that they cannot keep, and setting goals they cannot achieve, which mars their integrity, thereby leaving a negative impression in the minds of their team or staff eventually.

"first impressions matter, but they do not necessarily have to be made in the first meeting" 

DO

• ·         Appreciate

Appreciate the team or staff; let them know that you see your new position as a privilege and not a right or a proof of your expertise. Thank everyone and don’t make anyone feel less appreciate than another, even if you have worked in that organization before and you know a couple of exceptionally brilliant folks in your team.

• ·         Accept their contributions

Don’t misunderstand me, I didn’t say you should carry out all their contributions, I said you should accept them. Do not discard any suggestion or contribution in your first meeting, let them know you have accepted it and will consider.

• ·         Fix another meeting not very close to the first one

Because you did not tell them about what you want to achieve on the first meeting does not mean you should call another one the next day. See, whatever must last and have good effect must not be done hurriedly. Take time, schedule your next meeting for a time when you are sure that you must have understood what team or staff members said at the first meeting, and when you have fine-tuned your agenda for the organization.

Apart from these things you need to look out for, holding an excellent first meeting is not difficult but it is important to the results you get in your following days in that organization.

Author: OKUAZUN, Gideon Jayeola.brooksdaniels.com

Being The New CEO (Part 1)

As you trail the path of this piece, it is important to note that this is not just for Company Chief Executives but for everyone that  has decided to become responsible either by being saddled with leading people, or has the vision of doing so to achieve any task.


A major task that daunts many in life is being a point’s man in any project. Most of the time, people prefer to either lead from the middle wrung of the ladder or to back up a much more flashier partner; due to the fact that the point’s man takes all the risks associated with the task, accepts responsibility of the failure in any endeavor of the team and as a good leader, must share the victory with the entire team. This is a responsibility; few people are willing and able to take.


A whole lot is attached to being a leader especially someone who is prime at it such as a new CEO, that if not properly handled can affect one’s stay in that position. It is no gainsay, to mention that everyone is a CEO at some point in their lives, as there are some persons he or she leads, and in reality, no one can force himself on people to lead them and really be successful. If you are leading any group and you are making progress, it owes to the fact that, you are doing it right working with the people, otherwise, the management or board that put you there with expectancy of results, won’t hesitate to replace you with a more promising option.


Leading people requires you to show yourself responsible and credible: taking initiative, making sacrifices, having competences in certain areas, both soft and technical. In leadership, mere personality, that is, a mere public image, and not your true character, which is the real principles of living that you have imbibed, is danger impending. Therefore, to be successful especially as the new leader isn’t laborious when leadership isn’t just your personality but your true character. The reason is as the point’s man, your life gains maximum attention, your flaws become apparent, your subordinates have an extra duty of understanding you, and your reports which is a reflection of your real person becomes the enthusiasm of the board or management that has set you in that position.


 So, here is how to get started with being the new CEO:

Be the leader: Leadership is beyond position; it is the ability to lead yourself and others effectively. One very useful tip in being the leader is to view the new position as a privilege, realizing your accountability to your followers and higher authorities.


During my undergraduate days in Crawford University, at my new appointment as a director of the largest group on campus, after we had been introduced and congratulated by the Vice Chancellor and all the management of the organization, we had a meeting with our then president. In the meeting, the president said something that got to me, and I reiterate “if there is noise during your departmental meeting where you are the director but your effort to restore order seems futile, and there appears someone from the crowd who asks the people to be quiet, if they all obey him without hesitation, consider yourself a figure-head”. Certain things can be responsible for that; the chief of them might be lack of interest in following you due to lack of trust in you, their unbelief in your leadership abilities, or your character flaws.


While I occupied that position, I had an assistant who had been in that department even before I gained admission. He knew everything about the department and had sacrificed a lot for that organization. He had enough strength, knowledge and connection to be the point man, but for some reasons, I was picked. I had a lot of personal issues with this assistant because he was bitter about my privileged appointment. Honestly, I was initially intimidated. I felt like a round peg in a square hole.


On our first day working together, he made me carry heavy equipment and do tasks that revealed he was the real leader…That continued till the end of the session which made our president worried, and he asked me to do something about it. During the holiday, I spread out my wings and did the following which helped me resume as the leader of the department:

I got a vision for the department. I drew a blue print, and wrote out clearly the role everyone had to play in achieving the vision.

I developed more technical skills by reading and learning from my contemporaries elsewhere.

I kept in touch with all members of the team, putting a call through to each of them as regular as I could, preparing their minds for the things I wanted us to achieve as a team upon resumption of the new session.

 I also planned, for our first meeting in the new session.

Catching a vision for the organization
My holy book says “where there is no vision, the people perish”. Perishing not only pertains to the physical body. When there is no vision, an organization will perish, and usually the point’s man, the CEO, the man at the helms of affairs is the first to perish. In fact, others that are wise may escape before the perishing gets to them.


Knowing where you are going as leader that is having a vision, is very essential; it determines who you will take along, it determines if the people you intend to take along will be willing to follow you, because nobody follows a man without a definite vision. Having a vision keeps you going in the face of challenges.

Developing the required skills to be the effective CEO

Having a vision is not sufficient in itself, it is equally essential to know how you intend to get there. A wise man once said “The labor of the foolish wearies every one of them because he knows not how to go to the city”. The destination in view here is the city, the CEO must know how to go there, and he must be able to confidently lead the organization in their journey to the ‘city’.


In every organization where I have worked and lead with results, the first thing I learn about is the goal or vision of the organization, and how I can lead in achieving their goals or vision.

This article is by Okuazun Gideon Jayeola,