1. Taking Hold: Transition from newly appointed manager to recognized leader.
   Corrective actions taken where and as required.
2. Immersion: Intense and focused learning of how the organization
   functions.
3. Reshaping: Initiation of major change(s) if required.
4. Consolidation: Follow through and adjustments from Reshaping.
5. Refinement:: Incremental learning and change.

Our work with leadership transitions is focused on ensuring that the expectations and promise of this critical time are realized as quickly as possible. We focus on helping leaders and their new staff to get up, running and off to a good start . We have designed and assembled a portfolio of tools and processes that greatly speed up the “Taking Hold” and “Immersion” phases of the new leader’s transition. This work then sets the foundation, tone and alignment needed for the later “Reshaping” phase.

Our New Leader Transition Session is best done within the first two months of the transition and is usually a one or a two day session with the new leader and his or her team. Based on an initial evaluation, we work with the new leader and his/her boss to design the leadership transition process that is best suited for his/her new circumstances. Some of areas of focus and intervention processes that may be drawn upon for Taking Hold and Immersion are:

• Taking Hold: From appointed manager to recognized leader.
  • New Leader Interview: We have a list of 40 questions that staff members have of their new boss yet seldom, if ever, ask. Each question is like an air bubble trapped in a heating& cooling system, preventing ideas and actions from freely circulating within the team. These questions, left unasked and unanswered can slow and confound the whole transition process. We work with the staff to identify the most critical questions they have about and for their new boss. The questions are then asked and answered in an interactive interview format. Members often remark that in an hour they have learned more about their new leader then they ever learned about his/her predecessor.
  • Team Building: A part of any successful transition is to build the relational, interpersonal and team bonds between members and their new leader. Processes such as personal style indicators, Johari Window, personal life lines and various team building interventions are all good means for getting at jump starting team effectiveness. • Leadership Contracting: In the early stages of the transition new leaders find themselves in a dynamic leadership situation. They know very little and yet action is required. What things to act on and, more importantly, how to act on them can be a long and difficult process to “get right”. Leadership Contracting allows members and their new leader to quickly and clearly contract for mutual expectations and needs. This process builds the support and commitment the new leader needs to act quickly, decisively and with confidence.
• Immersion: Intense and focused learning of how the organization really functions.
• Current Reality: What are the forces, events, trends, productive and unproductive patterns impacting the organization today? The current reality allows management teams to discuss, organize and confront these important issues together, early on. For the new leader this is a rare and valuable snapshot of the organization.
• Road Map / Metaphor: How did we get to where we are today? How is the organization today a product of how it was in the past? Organizational road maps and metaphors are powerful tools for surfacing organizational dynamics. Too often when staff members discuss the organizational past, they are at best viewed as traditionalists, at worst, obstructionists. This process helps new leaders to understand the organizations past, the historical context they are entering. Staff members appreciate the opportunity to share with their new leader the trials, successes and lessons from their collective past.
• Goal Alignment: This process allows members and the new leader to quickly and visibly see how the efforts and activities of the various staff members align and interlock with organizational goals.
• Structural “Scrimmages”: The Structural Scrimmage is a process for allowing the new leader and all members to better understand how the organization functions. Too often new leaders embark upon restructuring efforts without first understanding how the existing structure functions. It is imperative that all members and the new leader be clear on how the organizational structure is supposed to function.

The Structural Scrimmage is a process which allows the leadership team to “exercise” the organizations structure. This is much like a “pregame chalk board” session where members go over assignments, talk through likely/difficult organizational scenarios and generally tweak or transform their structure. Structural Scrimmages help new leaders to quickly gain an understanding of how the organization responds to any number of situations. The new leader learns a great deal and members are often surprised at how divergent their views are on how the organization is supposed to function.

• Role Clarity: Within the structure, role clarity and alignment are issues that new leaders must become familiar with quickly. Our role clarity processes can get at everything from job descriptions and key interdependencies to sources of role stress.