Finding your Voice

Jane’s new role as Chief Marketing Officer in her organisation was a ‘stretch promotion’ to the Senior Leadership Team, the top group of the business that made all the key strategic decisions.

Two weeks into the role, Jane called me. ‘Sean, I need your help. My first SLT meeting was a disaster. I don’t know why, but I seemed to get it all wrong. They either ignored me or looked at me like they were disappointed. The CEO did nothing to bring me into the discussion when I thought he'd help me. I feel like I don’t have the right to say anything. What do I need to do to find my voice?’ A big promotion like Jane's, from seasoned manager to new executive, can be a cold shock. Your self-doubt intensifies when it meets a comfortable group that got along well enough without you. Here are some pointers to making a strong contribution quickly.

Choose new battles

The group’s old issues are new to you. Some weren’t visible to you in your old role. One of my clients got a shock, to say the least, when he learnt that the Chair and CEO had initiated secret merger discussions. Even if you’ve had a good briefing you can get overwhelmed by the complexity of new information that takes time to absorb. Before you can find your voice you need to understand the history of the group’s main issues, the real history behind the dry, formal, edited Minutes. Some ways to do this are:

• Survey your new peers for their views.
• Identify as precisely as you can, how your expertise can help.
• Drop any issues which are too complex or divisive to address now.
• Turn your newness to advantage by asking the dumb question that provokes new thinking.

Plan your research as part of your onboarding process to understand the existing team and what they’ve been through. You may not be their peer on everything (yet), but you are their peer on niche matters. Your research will help you be clear and convinced about this.

It takes time to get across the issues and gather support for your view, so some battles are best left until you’re up to speed. 

Cut them some slack.

It takes time for any team to admit a new executive as a real peer. There’s always a power play when a new person joins a top level decision-making group and it's not always subtle!

It's a matter of trust and competition. Their careers are now more vulnerably dependent on you than before, so they will weigh your experience and assess your right to join them. For example, Jane was frustrated at first that she was not automatically on all the mailing lists for team information. This oversight felt deliberate. It left her looking uninformed at crucial moments through missing important meetings or documents.

It can be tough to become a peer when a week before you were a subordinate and this simple exclusion reminded her of the fact. Obviously not all apparent slights or exclusions are deliberate, so give them the benefit of the doubt and let your gracious handling of the matter influence them.

Power language

Your credibility relies not only on what you know but on how you portray your power. So choose your language. Speak as a peer who deserves to be there. This is a matter of tone, vocabulary, pace and emphasis, the same skills you need in public speaking. However, there are some other behaviours that will gain you gravitas and acceptance.

• Don’t apologise or attempt to smooth the path before saying what you think.
• Start strong.
• You don’t need to apologise when it’s new material – you’ve demonstrated that you can learn fast. In particular, be assertive about your own expertise, but not patronising.
• Don’t downplay your genuine experience and knowledge of any issue.
• Don’t defer to the loudest talker - bullies love to be deferred to because they're basically afraid of you. By stepping back, you can confirm their doubts that you’re not up to the job and lack confidence. It’s still possible to be heard quietly.
• Demonstrate respect that you're accessing secrets. It's sensitive for the group that a previous subordinate (or an outsider) is now seeing what really happens, including their past mistakes.
• Don’t show them up. Your talent and ability won you the role but ramming home small victories won’t win trust. I hit this issue yet again only this week, with a client whose fast, strong performance unwittingly contradicted his boss's line that it was all too hard.
• Attack the issue and not the person (always!). Even if you see colleagues attack each other, their long term trust may explain why they fight hard in the room about important issues and still like each other outside it!
• Make it clear you’re interested in adding objective value to the existing discussion.
• Don't turn it in a direction that just suits you.
• Don’t ‘dive bomb’ the discussion by waiting to the end to contradict an emerging agreement. That only proves you’re manipulative & trying too hard to exert influence.

No one is immune from the challenges of joining teams. You can still be the 'new kid on the block' in your 60s! It won't all be smooth sailing but these strategies have helped my clients quickly grow from new executive to respected leader.