When starting in a new organization, how do you approach your first 30 days on the job?

Carefully.

The key here is that, unless it’s a brand new company, there are already people in place who have been doing their best to make the company successful. Thus it will be incumbent upon me to first understand what they have been doing, before trying to improve the existing methodologies or approach.

That’s really just applying common sense to human behaviour, but then there are invariably nuances to the business that will take time to learn. Right or wrong, it’s worth understanding why things are currently being done the way they are. After all, I want to be at my next position for many years – so 30 days is nothing, compared to the time that is takes to grow a company, from small to medium to large.

Having said that … since I will be entering the company in a senior role, naturally it’s expected of me to come up with ideas for improving the way that things are done. Be it a different approach to marketing, customer relations, corporate strategy, use of technology, development methodologies or anything else, part of my job will always be always to optimize processes.

That means listening, watching and learning, in order to find out who is doing what, how, when, where and why (i.e. I’ve taught this stuff to university students and the 5 W’s really do apply). Sure, if I have some good ideas right off the bat, then I’ll share them – but discreetly. Better

still, if I can encourage someone else to move forward with a good idea of their own, then they can feel appreciated and the company moves forward, too.

That’s actually not hard to do in this context, since those first 30 days are precisely when people are most likely to share their ideas with a newcomer. Besides, effective leaders do not need big egos. They surround themselves with competent people and do not hesitate to give them credit for good ideas, or to take responsibility for bad ones.