Every day in organizations across the globe, managers are hired into or assigned to new teams. Building rapport and trust quickly is essential for the team to realize its potential so helping managers and their direct reports adjust to the new leader is paramount. Over the years, I have found a very simple half-day exercise can help accelerate this process and set the new manager and team off on the right foot. This process is known as the New Manager Assimilation Process although I have also heard it referred to as New Manager Quick Start or New Manager Feedback Program. Regardless of the name, it's a simple and effective exercise that only requires a few hours.
There are three major objectives in utilizing the New Manager Assimilation Process:
To provide direct reports with the opportunity to "get to know" their new manager in a very short period of time.
To begin to build the basis for a longer-term working relationship between the manager and their team of direct reports, and;
To lay the foundation, very early on, for open communications, work planning and problem-solving between the manager and their direct reports.
The process itself consists of five sequential phases:
Data Collection
Feedback to the New Manager
Response Preparation
Manager Response and Discussion
Follow-up
The process begins with the help of a facilitator, who is viewed by the Manager and the direct reports as an objective third party. The credibility of this consultant is very important to the process since they will gather highly confidential data from both the manager and the team. The willingness of the people participating to share such data can be enhanced significantly if the consultant is viewed as objective, trustworthy, able to handle confidences, and competent in organizational development processes.
Phase One: Data collection
This consists of an informal meeting between the consultant and direct reports, usually lasting anywhere between two and four hours. Often this begins with the Manager opening the meeting and explaining that this process is important for the team to quickly build rapport and skip through a process of mutual understanding that often takes months to establish in the regular course of business. The manager implores that they expect candor, that confidentiality will be respected, and they encourage full participation.
The consultant explains the whole process, what they can hope to achieve through it , how it will work, the role they play, and reinforces to everyone that all information shared will be treated with confidentiality.
The facilitator then says they will cover seven basic questions (these can be modified, contracted or expanded depending on the team, the manager, the time and the situation), but essentially the key questions are as follows:
What do we already know about the new manager?
What don't we know, but would like to know about our new manager?
What are our concerns, both group and individual, about this person becoming our new manager?
What do we want or need most from the new manager?
What would we like the new manager to know about us, either as individuals or as a group?
What are the major problems we think the new manager will be focusing on during the first year? (in order of importance)
How are we going to help our new manager be successful?
Once the questions have been presented, facilitator does their best to go through one question at a time and capture on the flip charts all replies. Data collection offers an opportunity for the team to learn from one another about things they each have observed about their manager in the short time they have worked together that others may benefit from (ie--they answer their phone more at certain times of the day, they have 3 children, they love to play badminton...etc).
Throughout this first part of the program, the consultant must be cautious to help the group walk the fine line that separates an open, honest dialogue from a session filled with nothing but complaints. Data collected in this meeting is for the purpose of constructing a positive foundation on which this new team will be built. It is certainly an appropriate place to air old gripes and raise new concerns, but with the intent of moving the group ahead in a more positive way. Without discouraging data, the consultant can continue to remind the group that this assimilation process is intended to bridge the gap between the new manager and them, not to widen it.
Phase Two: Feedback to the New Manager
Now that the information has been collected, the facilitator can move into the second phase of the process: Feedback to the New Manager. At this point, the team is dismissed and then in a one-on-one meeting with the new manager, the consultant reviews all of the group's responses to the questions .This phase is to help the manager understand the group's responses, identify big themes but not to comment on them.
This feedback process