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Series Outline

• So I Got Promoted, Now What?
• Stop Doing Your Old Job
• Employ the Same Successful Tactics
• Get to Know Your Peers
• Get a Trusted System
• Manage Your Email
• Manage Your Calendar
• Start Having Weekly One-On-Ones
• Recognize the Tendency to Revert

Your Hard Work Has Paid Off

You’ve work hard over the past few years, going the extra mile to make sure that everything in your charge has gone well. You’ve managed your individual and team projects well; you’ve organized your work and developed a personal discipline so that nothing has fallen through the cracks. And now your hard work has finally paid dividends. You’ ve been recognized with a promotion. So now what do you do?

This is a question that many highly skilled, highly technical people ask themselves once the euphoria of increased pay and acknowledgement has worn off.

Unfortunately, many don’t pursue the answer long enough to find it. Instead they get mired down into the daily routine of their new role and never explore how they could better prepare to succeed. Many languish in mediocrity at best, and fail at worst.

So what’s the first thing you need to do?

Stop Doing Your Old Job

Stop doing your old job. To many, this may sound too obvious to mention. If you are promoted to a new position, why would you want to continue doing your old job as well as the new one? Isn’t one job enough?

Unfortunately, in many cases it’s just not that discrete. Often the promotion is a “working promotion.” You’ve been promoted to Senior DBA, to Development Team Lead, to Manager of the Administration Team, or to Director of Operations. The promotion comes with a new title, an increase in pay, and some new responsibilities. However, you find that in addition to your new duties, you are still accountable for many of the same tasks you had before your promotion.

To be successful in your new role, you will need to approach it with the same fervor and dedication that led to your promotion. You won’t be able to do that if effectively if you are spending a significant amount of your time doing your old job. Something has to give and it had better be the old job.

“But, It’s Not My Job”

To be clear, I’m not advocating that you tell your boss “It’s not my job anymore.” when he asks you about something that was your direct responsibility prior to the promotion. They don’t want to hear that. And besides, unless your promotion has moved you to a completely new department, that task still falls under your purview. And it’ll remain your responsibility until you’re told specifically otherwise or your replacement can be found.

So, in order to stop doing your old job, you’ll need to identify people who can successfully step into the role you once occupied, or at least take on many of the responsibilities. This can be done through a series of progressively larger and more impacting steps: assign immediate tasks, delegate small projects, and create a growth plan for your team.

Assign Immediate Tasks

Many of us have daily, weekly, or even monthly tasks that require our time and attention. There are backups to verify, meetings to attend, status reports to create, numbers to run, and logs to review, to name but a few. None of these are particularly urgent. Many are not high profile. But all need to be done.

In your prior role, you probably handled each of these at part of your job. Those responsibilities were commiserate with your level. In your new role, however, many of those activities will drain one of the most precious resources you have: your time. If you can safely offload those discrete yet repetitive tasks to one or your team members, you’ll potential free several hours per week.

Delegate Small Projects

The next step is to begin delegating some of the projects for which you are responsible. Start small and work your way up. Don’t begin with a large, complex project with multiple moving parts requiring input from numerous colleagues. Start with a small, fairly self-contained project that can be accomplished without  much outside input. Expect to work closely with the team member to whom you’ve delegated the project.

Initially, delegating will not free up your time. On the contrary, it will likely consume more of your time in the short-term than if you just did it yourself. But the payoff is just around the corner, just a few months down the road. As you get better at delegating and your team learns how to run with the delegated projects, you’ll be able to do more and more. Delegation is a force multiplier once you pay the initial start up costs in time.

Create a Growth Plan for Your Team

The best people have a knack for bringing out the best in other people. They somehow get others to perform and exceed even their own expectations. You want those kind of people on your team. And if you want them on your team, you can bet that your boss wants them on his team, too.

One way to bring out the best in other people is to consciously and intentionally create a growth plan for each of them. Talk with them. Learn their aspirations. Discover their likes and dislikes. Create a plan to help  them grow professionally, technically, and interpersonally. In short, you’d eventually like for them to easily step into your shoes once you get promoted again.

Ifs, Ands, and Buts

But isn’t all this risky? Won’t one of your team members take your job? Or won’t they get promoted out from under you?

Fostering an environment where you can be more effective while growing your people is not “risky.” In fact, a good argument can be made for just the opposite. Not growing your team is risky. Creating an environment where personal growth is not evident, where the same old routine is done day in and day out, is far riskier to you than growing your team. The best people won’t want to stay in that environment. You’ll be left with the mediocre.

One of the best compliments you can be paid as a manager is to have one of your team members promoted to a new position. It’s speaks well of the environment you’ve created. And when that happens again and again, senior management will recognize your role in producing highly effective people.

And when you get promoted, you’re next transition will be easier because you’ll have already cultivated your replacement.

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You wouldn’t believe some of the systems and processes I’ve seen over the course of my 16 years as a consultant.

Some people know that they have a horrible patchwork of broken systems that are loosely held together by duct tape and bubble gum. Others think their system is “flexible except for this one issue we’d like for you to fix.” I’ve learned that one man’s flexibility is another’s bad design.

Fortunately experience begets familiarity and some of the issues I see are remarkably similar to ones that I’ve solved in the past.

It’s tempting to show them just how smart I am and immediately jump to the solution. In fact, cutting to the chase would save them time and money so everybody wins. Except there’s only one problem: I didn’t listen.

You’ve Got To Listen

Listening is incredibly important, not only for consultants, but for everyone. Regardless of your walk in life, being an good listener will help you as you work with other people. Listening helps people to feel understood, to feel that you care. And that goes a long way in building a relationship.

Conversely, if you don’t take the time to listen, other people don’t feel understood. You’re not listening, so you simply cannot understand what’s going on. They assume you don’t care or that you’re just too self-centered. Without a good understanding of the problem, they reason, how can you possibly offer a good solution?

So before you offer a solution, take some time to stop, drop, and roll.

Stop

Don’t interrupt their description of the problem. Let them tell it to you in all its glory, even if you’ve heard it all before. It’s important to them to tell it.

Most people feel their situations are unique and quite different than the problems you may have faced in the past. Let them tell you why. In fact, you may actually learn that their problem is subtly yet significantly different that what you were expecting.

Two rules to keep in mind. First don’t interrupt. If the other person is talking, be quiet. You can nod your head in agreement or smile when appropriate, but don’t say anything. Second, when the other person has stopped talking, count to 5 to make sure that he is really finished and not just regrouping his thoughts. Only then do you know it’s your turn to talk.

Drop

Drop a few clarifying questions back to the other person. Ask them to explain in more detail or from another perspective. Many people will focus solely on the immediate affects of the issue or what they deem as pertinent. If you delve a little deeper you can uncover a lot more information. Asking relevant questions also reassures them that you are listening.

Don’t limit yourself to abstract or technical questions. Ask them about the impact of what they are describing. How is this situation affecting them personally? How has the problem affected their job or other’s perception of them?

Getting personal helps you to understand their motives. This is especially powerful when talking with a prospective client.

Roll

Roll back what you hear them saying. Restate their problem and its affects. Summarizing or restating what they’ve told you helps makes sure that you, do indeed, understand their issue. It also communicates to them that you understand.

This also helps to transition the conversation. It’s moving from their turn to talk to your turn. They’ve described the problem, now it’s your turn to offer suggestions or recommendations.

Solve

After they have completely described their scenario to their satisfaction, then you are free to offer your guidance. Your initial assessment may have been right on, but they wouldn’t have listened to you since you didn’t listen to them. Listening cost you only a few more minutes of time and the rewards were definitely worth it.

So, the next time you’re visiting a prospective new client or someone approaches you with a problem, remember: Stop, Drop, and Roll.

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One of the hardest lessons to learn and put into practice is that of Real Cost versus Opportunity Cost. Let’s consider an example.

Real Cost

Real Cost is straightforward. If the water pipes in my house freeze and burst due to the cold weather, I can fix the leak myself or I can call a professional plumber. Those are my options. Sure, I could do without running water, but I’m fond of modern conveniences. So, let’s say I want to fix the leak.

Which is the better option – fixing the leak myself or hiring a professional? Assuming I have the know-how, fixing the leak myself sounds less expensive. In terms of Real Cost it is.

When I repair the bursted pipes myself, my only outlay is for the supplies required to stop the water from squirting out. I’ll need to run down to the hardware store to buy some replacement pipe and perhaps a couple of shiny new tools. That’s the extent of my Real Costs. Then I can roll up my sleeves and dive into the repairs.

If I call a plumber to come to my house and do the job for me, I don’t have to go to the hardware store. I don’t have to buy the materials myself. And I don’t have to find and fix the leak. But I do have to pay him to do these things for me. I have to pay for his time plus the materials he uses to remedy the problem.

So, calling a professional costs me time and materials whereas doing it myself costs only materials.

But that’s not really a complete picture. There’s an Opportunity Cost associated with the project.

Opportunity Cost

If I spend three hours repairing the ruptured pipes, that’s three hours that I’m not doing something else like working for my clients or spending time with my family. The things that I give up by not choosing them are the Opportunity Costs.

There are Opportunity Costs associated with every decision you make. Choosing one thing, by definition, will come at the expense of another.

In this case, the Opportunity Cost of fixing the burst pipes is the time I spend doing the work myself. A professional plumber can probably do the job in half that time. So from an economic perspective, I’m spending time doing something that I’m only marginally skilled at instead of focusing on areas where I’m more skilled. That’s underutilizing my effectiveness.

So in effect, I am paying for time and materials even when I do the job myself. I’m paying with my time rather than buying the plumber’s time. So the question becomes: how much is my time worth to me?

Unless the plumber charges twice my hourly rate or I don’t actually have the client work to do instead of fixing the broken pipes, it actually costs me less to pay someone else to do the job.

Applying The Calculation To Business

Real Costs versus Opportunity Costs apply to business as well. For example, should I outsource part of a project to another consultant?

Let’s say I’m a database consultant and I’m somewhat skilled in application development. I can do the application development work, but my area of expertise is in the database. Spending time developing the front end application is not a good use of my time. Someone else can do it better and faster than me. I should focus on the things that I do well.

The same goes for bookkeeping, web site development, and making reservations.

The concept also applies to managers and their team. If a manager does something that he could have delegated to a team member, it’s actually costing the organization. He could have delegated the task and had someone else do it, allowing him to focus on the things that only he can do.

There’s More To The Story

We must remember, however, that not all decisions are solely based on finances. Spending time with my family, working on the fence in the pasture, and volunteering as a Scout Leader all have Opportunity Costs associated with them. Despite being intangible, the results are well worth it. I’m not going to outsource some things.

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