Brigitte Witzer. Executive Coach, Rednerin und Autorin. Executive coaching – onboarding – the first 100 days

The transition into a new role is always a significant step in the professional life of an executive. Coaching gives you support for

• achieving faster top performance
• finding the key challenges
• identifying the key stakeholders, and
• initiating the first strategical actions in your new role.

Coaching normally commences 4-6 weeks before you enter your new role and comprises 3-5 sessions within a period of around 4 months. The process is concentrated on your personal focal points. If you have no previous experiences with your new environment, the focus lies on:

• change management
• power, politics and influence, as well as
• your personal strategic orientation, possibly supplemented by
• leadership with an entrepreneurial vision

Find the PDF here: transition_Feb2015_en

First a dream job, then a trauma? Before the contract is signed, everything looks attractive: the new role, the new responsibility, the greater scope of action. When the first steps need to be taken, it turns out that the difference between imagination and reality is tremendous, and it becomes clear how the polarities that have to be expected actually look like. Time and again, these opposite poles are:

• demands on the new leadership and their team, and the actual personal impression of their capabilities
• demands on all other stakeholders, and the actual personal impression of them
• necessary and actually available scope of action while dealing with the superior
• discrepancy between the required budget and what is actually available

Most of the time there is no second chance to make a good impression, even if the new boss happens to be met with plenty of goodwill at the beginning. But goodwill only goes that far. In an executive position you are simply expected to find your way quickly, to make extremely fast analyses, to be able to swiftly assess new situations and people, and to take your place accordingly in the structure of the company.

When the new company is very dynamic and, for example, you are expected to immediately implement a change, it is of utmost importance that you keep a distance between yourself and the structure. This is often the only way to be able to solve even difficult tasks with responsibility and ethical awareness, for the benefit of the company. New executives often lose their integrity  because they are swallowed by the complexity of their new assignment.

Find the PDF here: boss_Feb2015_en