Congratulations, boss! It’s extremely exciting to get a promotion and to manage a new team. While it is a proud moment, becoming a new manager comes with a lot of new responsibilities and can take some time and patience. It’s okay to make a few mistakes along the way – you’re new and still learning. However, there is some preparation you can do to make sure you are on the right track and feel confident when managing your team members. 

You might feel pressure to constantly be liked by everyone. This is a completely normal instinct, but in order to be the best leader you need to prioritize how you can best serve your team – focusing on goals, effective motivation, empathy and support to help everyone be their best. 

5 Tips to Succeed as a New Manager 

Here are five tips to help you prepare for your new role as a first-time manager. 

Tip #1: Prioritize building trust 

When there is trust, there is loyalty that will come with it. As you build trust, you make your team members feel like they can come to you with any issues – good or bad – and they will feel supported by you. You want to show your team that you are credible and trustworthy so they can be comfortable with having you as their manager.  

Additionally, you need to trust your team to handle their tasks and projects. Avoid micromanaging or constantly checking in on them. As a manager, you want to be ready to delegate and let your team take charge of what they were hired to do while providing support and expertise along the way, especially when you see they need help. 

Tip #2: Improve communication 

Communication will be key to being successful as a manager. Communicate as openly, honestly and transparently as possible. Schedule 1:1 meetings to check in with your team members to gauge what they need, what’s working, or what needs to be improved. Make sure your team is up to date with everything that’s going on with the company and have open discussions to have them more involved when they can be. 

In a remote setting, communication is especially important to make sure everyone is on the same page and everyone feels a sense of belonging and connection with their team. Let your team also know the preferred method of communication and encourage them to ask questions and provide feedback. 

Tip #3: Don’t immediately jump to blame 

Mistakes happen. The last thing you want to do is play the blame game. When an issue arises, you want to focus more on the solution and learn from where things went wrong, so you and your team can focus on fixing it and not repeating the same mistake in the future.  

As a new manager, you don’t want to be feared, but rather a leader who is calm under pressure and can help everyone move on and learn from errors.  

Tip #4: Get to know your team 

While you may know some of your team members, as a new manager you should take the opportunity to learn more about the people on your team. Understand your team members’ strengths, backgrounds, experiences and what their passions are. This will help you understand where they want to grow and what opportunities they may be working toward.  

Taking the time to know your team will show your empathy toward them, and also make them more comfortable around you because it’s clear you care about them as individuals. This helps to build trust and loyalty as well as improve communication. 

Tip #5: Be open to feedback 

As you give feedback to your team, you want to encourage your team to give you feedback as well. This is a great learning opportunity to help you understand where you need to improve and what the team also needs to do their projects and tasks more efficiently.  

Don’t take negative feedback personally, but use it as a constructive way to set goals for yourself and keep in mind what might be missing in the team.

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