From the Publisher
Whether challenged with taking on a startup, turning a business around, or inheriting a high-performing unit, a new leader's success or failure is determined within the first 90 days on the job.
In this hands-on guide, Michael Watkins, a noted expert on leadership transitions, offers proven strategies for moving successfully into a new role at any point in one's career. The First 90 Days provides a framework for transition acceleration that will help leaders diagnose their situations, craft winning transition strategies, and take charge quickly.
Practical examples illustrate how to learn about new organizations, build teams, create coalitions, secure early wins, and lay the foundation for longer-term success. In addition, Watkins provides strategies for avoiding the most common pitfalls new leaders encounter, and shows how individuals can protect themselves-emotionally as well as professionally-during what is often an intense and vulnerable period.
Concise and actionable, this is the survival guide no new leader should be without.
December 19, 2003 -
The Economist
It is meant for, and should be useful to, anyone about to make a change.
October 9, 2003 -
Financial Times
"... Watkins offers a do-it-yourself road map for executives, whether ... moving into start-ups, leading turnarounds, orchestrating changes or sustaining high-performance companies."
November 10, 2003 -
Fortune
Watkins provides enough statistics, charts, and checklists to help any newly minted boss roam the halls with confidence.
Nov.12, 2003 -
The Globe and Mail
...an easy-to-ready and easy-to-follow handbook that no doubt will become a classic for anybody entering a new position.
October 27, 2003 -
ExecuNet
Watkins' book is packed with tested real-world advice designed to help the new executive make a strong first impression...
Soundview Executive Book Summaries
In The First 90 Days, Harvard Business School professor Michael Watkins presents a road map for taking charge in your first 90 days in a management job. The first days in a new position are critical because small differences in your actions can have a huge impact on long-term results.
Leaders at all levels are very vulnerable in their first few months in a new job because they lack in-depth knowledge of the challenges they'll face and what it will take to succeed with their new company. Failure to create momentum in the first 90 days virtually guarantees an uphill battle for the rest of an executive's tenure.
The First 90 Days will equip you with strategies and tools to get up to speed faster and achieve more sooner. This summary will show you how to diagnose your situation and understand its challenges and opportunities. You'll also learn how to assess your own strengths and weaknesses, how to quickly establish priorities, and how to manage key relationships that will help you succeed.
Promote Yourself
"Promoting yourself" doesn't mean self-serving behavior, grandstanding or hiring a PR firm to tell the world about you. It means mentally preparing yourself to move into your new role by putting the past behind you and getting a running start by working hard to learn all you can about your new position.
Accelerate Your Learning
Usually when a new leader swerves off course, failure to learn is a factor. There is so much new information to absorb that it's difficult to know where to focus and important signals can be missed. Or when a new boss focuses too heavily on the technological side of the business - products, customers, technologies and strategies - critical learning about culture and politics is shortchanged.
The fact that few managers have received training in systematically diagnosing an organization compounds the problem. Those who have had such training are usually human resource professionals or former management consultants.
Match Strategy to Situation
Far too many new leaders don't effectively diagnose their situations and tailor their strategies accordingly. Then, because they don't understand the situation, they make unnecessary mistakes. This painful cycle happens because people usually model their transitions on a limited set of experiences.
Matching your strategy to your situation requires diagnosing the business situation carefully. Only after you've diagnosed the situation can you act wisely about the challenges of your new job and the opportunities and resources available to you.
Secure Early Wins
By the end of your transition, you want your boss, your peers and your subordinates to feel that something new and good is happening. Early wins excite and energize people, build your credibility, and quickly create value for your organization. It's crucial to get early wins, but it is also important to get them the right way.
Negotiate Success
Negotiating success means engaging with your new boss to shape the game so you have a good chance of achieving your goals. Too many new leaders just play the game, reacting to the situation that exists and failing as a result. Negotiate with your boss to establish realistic expectations, reach agreement on the situation, and secure sufficient resources to get things done.
Achieve Alignment
The higher you climb in an organization, the more you assume the role of organizational architect, creating an environment in which others can perform well. No matter how charismatic you are, you can't hope to do much if key elements in your unit are out of alignment.
If strategy, structure, systems and skills are within your purview in your new position, you need to begin to analyze the architecture of your organization and assess alignment among these key elements. You can't hope to do much more than conduct a solid diagnosis and perhaps get started on addressing alignment issues in the first few months. But plans to assess the architecture of your group and to begin identifying areas for improvement should be included in your 90-day plan.
Build Your Team
If you create a high-performance team, you can exert tremendous leverage to create value. If not, you'll face severe difficulties because no leader can hope to achieve ambitious goals on his or her own. Poor personnel choices will usually come back to haunt you.
Finding the right people is essential, but it's not enough. Begin by evaluating current team members to decide who will stay and who will have to go. Then create a plan for obtaining new people and moving the people you keep into the right positions without doing too much damage to short-term performance. But even this is not enough. You still must establish goals, incentives and performance measures that will propel your team in the desired directions.
Create Coalitions
If your success depends on the support of people outside your direct line of command, it's important to create coalitions to get things done. Direct authority is never enough to win the day. "Influence networks" - informal bonds among colleagues - can help you generate support for your ideas and goals. Copyright © 2004 Soundview Executive Book Summaries
What People Are Saying
Goli Darabi
Few companies develop a systematic 'on-boarding' process for their new leaders, even though this is a critical function with major organizational implications. Michael Watkins's The First 90 Days provides a powerful framework and strategies that will enable new leaders to take charge quickly. It is an invaluable tool for that most vulnerable time-the transition. (Senior Vice President, Corporate Leadership & Succession Management, Fidelity Investments)
Colonel Eli Alford
Every job-private- or public-sector, civilian or military-has its breakeven point, and everyone can accelerate their learning. Read this book at least twice: once before your next transition-before getting caught up in the whirl and blur of new faces, names, acronyms, and issues; then read it again after you've settled in, and consider how to accelerate transitions for your next new boss and for those who come to work for you. (U.S. Army)
Suzanne M. Danielle
Watkins provides an excellent road map, telling us what all new leaders need to know and do to accelerate their learning and success in a new role. The First 90 Days should be incorporated into every company's leadership development strategy, so that anyone making a transition in an organization can get up to speed quicker and smarter. (Director of Global Leadership Development, Aventis)
Gordon Curtis
Michael Watkins has nailed a huge corporate problem and provided the solution in one fell swoop. The pressure on new leaders to hit the ground running has never been greater, and the likelihood and cost of failure is escalating. Watkins's timing with The First 90 Days is impeccable. (Principal, Curtis Consulting)
Mike Kinkead
The First 90 Days is a must-read for entrepreneurs. Anyone who's been the CEO of a start-up or early-stage company knows that you go through many 90-day leadership transitions in the course of a company's formative years. In this groundbreaking book, Michael Watkins provides crucial insights, as well as a toolkit of techniques, to enable you to accelerate through these transitions successfully. (President and CEO, timeBLASTER Corporation, serial entrepreneur, and Cofounder and Trustee, Massachusetts Software Council)
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