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Are We Setting People Up to Succeed?

Michelle Battista

We've all seen it, or perhaps experienced it ourselves.

Someone is brilliant at their job. They're knowledgeable, highly capable, respected by their colleagues, and naturally become the obvious choice when a management opportunity comes along.

But managing people is a very different skill from doing the job itself.

Many managers find themselves leading teams not because they set out to become leaders, but because they excelled in their previous role. They're often referred to as "accidental managers."

This has been a big topic of conversation in my house recently. My 21-year-old daughter has applied for a Team Leader role after doing exceptionally well in her current position. One of the interview questions she was asked was how she would feel managing colleagues who have been with the organisation longer than her, people who applied for the role and weren't successful, and even friends she currently works alongside.

We often promote people because they're great at what they do, but we don't always equip them with the skills needed to manage people, navigate difficult conversations, build credibility, or lead former peers.

Management can be one of the most rewarding roles in an organisation, but it can also be one of the most challenging. The impact a manager has on employee experience, engagement, wellbeing and performance is huge.

There may be some new managers out there that could do with a bit of moral support or some practical advice and guidance to support them on their new journey so I’d love to hear your experiences and tips for those stepping into leadership for the first time.

Looking back, what's one piece of advice you wish you'd been given before managing people for the first time?

Or, if you're new to management, what's been your biggest learning so far?

P.S. I'll be sharing these tips with my daughter too Wink, so thank you in advance for any words of wisdom!

As a little return from me, the CIPD and FutureLearn offer a free People Management Skills course that's ideal for aspiring, new, or existing line managers looking for a refresher.

The course takes around 3 hours per week over 5 weeks and covers practical people management skills to help build confidence in leading others. There's also the option to purchase a certificate on completion if you'd like one.


Feel free to share it with anyone who is stepping into management for the first time, considering a leadership role, or simply looking to strengthen their people management skills. Blush

  • Brilliant question to ask as based on my experience, manager inaction is the main cause of issues becoming larger than they need to and has a massive negative impact on productivity in the country.

    I was lucky in that i worked for Tesco when i first took on a management role at the ripe old age of 23. They sent me on a week long management course before I was let loose on a team.

    The best thing i learned on that was the importance of having a conversation early. They also taught me how to positively phrase feedback - making sure that when there was an issue, i focussed the conversation on what I needed them to do in the future, rather than giving a negative 'telling off'

    This was really important as on my first day in the new role, I had a new starter. We had a 60 minute lunch break and to cover the office half went at 12 and half at 1. I had briefly explained this to my new starter but they disappeared for 2 hours.  I didn't want to discuss it with him but the training gave me confidence. Towards the end of the day I arranged a bit of a how the first day went conversation.  We had a general conversation and then I mentioned that he had taken a 2 hour lunch and was everything ok. he said he had a birthday present to get and in his previous job he could take a 2 hour lunch as long as he made the time back so was planning on staying an hour later.

    I thanked him and explained that because we had to cover the office, we generally had an hour and if people took extra if could mean someone would struggle to take their break. Therefore it was important that whilst we can take longer on occasions if we needed to go into the City and would need longer, that would normally be ok, but they needed to check with me first so I could make sure that we had office cover over the lunchtime period.

    It was a very easy conversation as it was focussed on what I needed him to do in the future and it fixed the issue straight away. Had I not had that training I may not have had the confidence to raise it. he would have continued to do it, My Team would have got  frustrated with me and I would have got more and more annoyed with him. When it became untenable, It probably would have been a far bigger issue than it needed to.

    So i think my key things would be 

    1) Address issues straight away

    2) Focus conversations on what you want them to do in future, not what they did wrong in the past

  • in reply to Teresa

    Thank you for sharing your experience and these great tips!   

    I asked her if they were giving her any management training and she said no (this is probably quite common too)..... and she has two new starters in her team she is training up too, along with overseeing the biggest partnership contract.  Every tip like this makes a big difference and hope they'll help others that are new to people management too.  

    p.s. my daughter started out in Tesco, and did a little supervision there ;)

  • Accidental manager here! Well, that's how I started anyway. I was 21 and so incredibly proud of myself that I was the youngest manager in the organisation. For me, an absence of official management training meant I looked to the managers and leaders around me. I looked up to them, so to speak. 

    Unfortunately, personal pride and being surrounded by poor leadership clouded my judgement. I knew what it meant to be a good, kind and caring person - someone who cared for others. But, I let power become my style of management, as if you couldn't be a kind manager. I'd only seen task managers and not people managers. That's what I was used to seeing but I knew how I felt being managed that way, how my peers felt. 

    Somehow I forgot what it meant to be human. While I know that I am responsible for that shift in my behaviour, not knowing what good leadership looked like didn't help. I made an assumption that "this is what managers do, how they behave" but deep down, that wasn't my definition of a good person, not something I'd aspire to be. Why did I separate being a good person from being a manager? 

    I'm grateful to have been able to learn from my mistakes but it means accidental management is something I'm passionate about. It's certainly shaped my leadership today, but if I can support others to have a different start, I'd like to. 

    So in short, my advice:

    1. Don't forget what it means to be a good person. Management doesn't come without tough decisions or difficult conversations, but both of those tend to be a lot easier when you have good intentions and you think people, not just task. 

    2. Actively hunt for a mentor - and make your choices count. A good leader will make it their mission to 'give back' to those willing to learn. Take advantage of that. 

    3. Don't be afraid to be open or get things wrong, especially when you're young. Somehow you think you need all the answers, especially when you're faced with an environment where people may have been around a lot longer than you. You don't have all the answers, and so you shouldn't - there's no point in a team if one person can solve it all. Make it your mission to learn and never stop learning. 

    Wishing your daughter all the very best of luck. Exciting times ahead for her, I am sure! 

  • in reply to Samantha

    Really appreciate this Sam, and thank you for being so honest and upfront about how you started, your reflections and lessons learnt.  Love that, think people, not just task!  



  • "Catch them doing something right.   
    Help people  succeed - but don't do it for them".

    Just because you're the boss you don't have to know everything

    Respect is earned and not guaranteed just because you've been promoted. 

    Be humble, honest and approachable. 

    Don't be a know-all,  Don't have all the answers,  Don't be afraid to say you don't know.  Ask for opinions if you don't know, aren't sure, or the problem can be solved by different means. 

    Don't sit (hide)  behind a desk.

    Don't be afraid to ask people to do things - remember that YOU were given the job, and if you were given it for good reasons, your (ex) colleagues will know that and respect you for that.   

    If things start to get ??difficult, out of hand, worrying..... etc., say so - and deal with it now and not later.....

    if you've done, or said  something wrong - be honest and say so.  You aren't expected to be perfect.

    Your reputation as a colleague will follow you into being a boss.  Don't try to be popular or have 'favourites'.   Make sure you you are/were respected as a colleague.  If you were/are a pratt or ):ick head as a colleague, you'll still be one when you're the boss! 


    Good Luck





  • in reply to David Perry

    Love this   honest, open, straight talking advice! :) Hmm didn't think about the reputation thing!  They say you can teach skills but not behaviour/attitude.  Something to think about for those considering promoting someone into a leadership role.  Do they have the right behaviours to make a team thrive, grow and be their best?

  • in reply to Michelle Battista

    You might not be able to teach 'attitude', but  you can teach people both behaviour and  skill/s.

    There is a presumption that somehow HR is in  a better position to teach 'Management'.  I can't recall covering much , if anything, about people management when I did my DPM.  Perhaps its changed since I did my DPM?  :-)

  • Good luck to your daughter Michelle, I hope she flies in her career and loves it, whatever path she ends up being on. 

    Daniel Taylor has a great podcast called Managing Potential that's all about managers reflecting back on their learning which is worth a listen. 

    www.managingpotentialpodcast.com/podcast

    Firstly, I struggle with the term 'accidental manager' when really it's promoting someone without providing them with the tools to do their new job well. I've seen it happen over my career and it seems to happen more and more now as businesses often don't seem to feel they need to develop their people. Online, remote, e-learning, bitesize learning and on the job learning only goes so far. 

    Would a business accept an 'accidental finance manager' and not support them their formal training.  Businesses need to step up and we can help them - moan over :-)

    One piece of advice I wish I'd been given was:

    Everyone is different and the scenarios are different, it's not about being perfect, it's about knowing and having all the answers so keep learning.  

    Be yourself and learn to accept that others will/may see you differently with the manager title. 

    My biggest learning is that being open and honest about not knowing all the answers is actually a strength not a weakness. It opens me up to learning, shows I'm human and I think enables me to be a better manager. 

  • in reply to Sharon

    Thank you  and thank you for sharing your advice :)

    Ohh I've not seen this podcast, thank you for sharing, I will have a listen!

    Good point about an 'accidental finance manager'! 

  • I'd be really keen to hear from people who have seen an 'accidental manager' thrive with good support, learning and development and was has been most effective in building them into an effective manager- formal training, mentoring etc?