The Making of a Manager: What to Do When Everyone Looks to You

by Julie Zhuo

This is an important distinction because while the role of a manager can be given to someone (or taken away), leadership is not something that can be bestowed. It must be earned. People must want to follow you.

What did you and your past manager discuss that was most helpful to you? What are the ways in which you’d like to be supported? How do you like to be recognized for great work? What kind of feedback is most useful for you? Imagine that you and I had an amazing relationship. What would that look like?

Change is a prerequisite for improvement,

Discuss top priorities: What are the one, two, or three most critical outcomes for your report and how can you help her tackle these challenges? Calibrate what “great” looks like: Do you have a shared vision of what you’re working toward? Are you in sync about goals or expectations? Share feedback: What feedback can you give that will help your report, and what can your report tell you that will make you more effective as a manager? Reflect on how things are going: Once in a while, it’s useful to zoom out and talk about your report’s general state of mind—how is he feeling on the whole? What’s making him satisfied or dissatisfied? Have any of his goals changed? What has he learned recently and what does he want to learn going forward?

I’ve found that by showing up authentically, with my fears, mistakes, and uncertainties out in the open rather than swept under the rug, I’ve been able to build better relationships with my reports.

Call it what you want—fit, motivation, chemistry—but the things a person cares about must also be what the team (and company) cares about.

Failures will occur, projects will miss deadlines, and people will make mistakes. That’s okay. But when these things happen, readjusting expectations as quickly as possible helps people recover from errors with grace.

The question that should always be in the back of your mind is: Does my feedback lead to the change I’m hoping for?

No matter what obstacles you face, you first need to get deep with knowing you—your strengths, your values, your comfort zones, your blind spots, and your biases. When you fully understand yourself, you’ll know where your true north lies.

What are some ways to do this?

If I saw every challenge as a test of my worthiness, then I’d constantly worry about where I stood rather than how I could improve. It’s like stressing out more about your exam grade than about whether you’re actually learning the concepts being taught.

Fixed vs growth mindset

What kinds of challenges are interesting to you and why? Can you describe a favorite project? This tells me what a candidate is passionate about. What do you consider your greatest strengths? What would your peers agree are your areas of growth? This question gets both at a candidate’s self-awareness and what his actual strengths and weaknesses might be. Imagine yourself in three years. What do you hope will be different about you then compared to now? This lets me understand the candidate’s ambitions as well as how goal oriented and self-reflective she is. What was the hardest conflict you’ve had in the past year? How did it end, and what did you learn from the experience? This gives me a sense of how the candidate works with other people and how he approaches conflict. What’s something that’s inspired you in your work recently? This sheds light on what the candidate thinks is interesting or valuable.

Try these next timr!

Effort doesn’t count; results are what matter. I learned this my first week on the job when I was told the origin story of one of Facebook’s most popular products.

This goes against growth mindset!

Sheryl Sandberg was the one who taught me otherwise. Some years ago, Sheryl started talking to the company about the importance of hard conversations. Whenever we’re feeling tension with our coworkers—they have a habit that irritates us, we disagree about an important decision, or they do something that seems thoughtless—she encouraged us to sit down with the other person and discuss that tension openly. Because if you don’t, nothing will get better, and resentment will only grow.

Wow, i am totally aligned with this! I need to continue to chsmpion this.

A group of people working in unison is a wonderful thing to behold. Done well, it ceases to be about you or me, one individual or another. Instead, you feel the energy of dozens or hundreds or even thousands of hearts and minds directed toward a shared purpose, guided by shared values. If you or I do our jobs well, then our teams will thrive. We will build something that will outlast us, that will be made stronger by all who become a part of it.