The first few days as a leader of a new team can be daunting, as you plan how you want to set your expectations, build your team and eventually lead change. Here are ten tips to help:

1/ Accept feeling you are an impostor
Impostor syndrome is a deep feeling that you are not enough, despite all evidence to the contrary. Remember that it is a universal experience (as I’ve written about here), and not yours alone. Join the club – no one feels perfectly equipped to begin a role. But the truth is you were appointed to do a job, so the sooner you get over this hurdle the better. One way to do this is to genuinely help someone in your team. In this way you provide practical value to someone straight away. Focus on them not you. People always need support, and you are in the position to help, so assume it’s your job to help them.

2/ Avoid comparison
Especially with what went before. New leaders sometimes run down their predecessor, or suggest that everything before was broken, and that they are the person to fix it. It’s a lazy trope, can be unkind, is probably untrue and certainly unhelpful. Focus instead on where you’re coming from: an accurate evaluation of where you are, what’s effective now and what needs to improve. This builds, in a much more honest way, on what’s good. People will respect you for how you manage this transition, for what you choose to say and what you omit saying.

3/ Don’t waste time on vision
Vision is a rabbit hole which can take too much of your time dreaming up bland phrases, when what people actually want is someone who will bring clarity, focus on the right things and get them done. That’s enough vision to get started with. Don’t waste your time on ‘creating vision’ or thinking that you need to ‘be visionary’ at the start.

4/Describe what you want to see
Make your expectations simple, clear and fall to see. Rephrase them. Think of ways to punctuate the year by doing this. Most leaders regret not being clear enough about what they want, and most of the difficult conversations we end up having, would have been unnecessary had we been clearer at the start. The best way to do this is to…

5/ Know what excellent looks like
One of your key tasks as a leader is to find the best practice, then create a mechanism for connecting this with colleagues who need to see it.

6/ Build the morale of your team
Praise people for working hard and doing the right things. Most of the job of the leader is to recognise and thank the people who are doing excellent things, and shine a torch for everyone to see this practice and borrow these ideas. Don’t over-complicate this process. People want to hear praise and feel feedback that’s genuine, specific and timely.

7/ Be comfortable saying I don’t know early on
It’s a much stronger response when you say, I don’t know can I come back to you, or even, can I have time to think about that, instead of pretending to have an answer, which fools no one. People will then respect you for your honesty and humility. (make sure you follow up with the answer!)

8/ Know who the three groups are in your team
Generally, colleagues know: (a) who is doing a good job, (b) who is asking for help and (c) who needs to work harder.

Group (a) need recognition, greater responsibility, their practice to be shared more widely.

Group (b) need help from you – a clear program of support which gives them milestones to help them see the progress that they are making (they’ll thank you for the way you did it and they will be your biggest support in the future).

Group (c) need honest feedback about what they are not doing, greater clarity in your expectations of them, and they need to be matched with someone in group (a). Most will see this as the feedback they’ve been waiting for and will thank you for your honesty, however difficult this is for you to deliver.

The rest of your colleagues will be delighted to realise that you recognise excellence, that you know how to help those who need support and that you can give feedback even when it’s tough. This clarity is so rare: it will be like cool water on a hot day.

9/ Planning
Only draw up a plan when you’ve done lots of listening, and you’ve done your best to incorporate the team’s thinking into it. Then, assuming its important, bring the plan to relevant meetings and refer to it often. Walk around with it and don’t let it sit in a metaphorical filing cabinet. Ask your line manager/ governors/ trustees how your success will be judged, and then be clear what it is that they want you to deliver on. Your plan should help you to communicate that. These are your minimum expectations of yourself – everything else you achieve is bonus.

10/ Learning habits help you to enjoy it
Leading can be tough, but in my experience it’s certainly not lonely. One way to stay even more connected is to stay in learning mode: call on people in your network when you’re not sure what to do, keep a journal, prioritise your own CPD, read, be humble about what you don’t know and find a mentor, to help with the gaps we all inevitably have.