What Are You Going to Do on Day One?

That question, more than any other, stumps our clients. Most leaders fail to think about and plan Day One as thoroughly as it deserves. In fact, even those leaders who do a phenomenal job throughout the Fuzzy Front End find themselves stumbling on their first day. For some reason, leaders are often lulled into complacency when deciding what to do on Day One. Often they passively accept a schedule that someone else has planned out for them. Or they plan to do what seems to be the traditional Day One activities of meeting those people around their office or filling out the required forms, unpacking, and setting up their office.

Not you. What you say and do on Day One is going to inspire others. Not with cheesy motivational tactics, but through meaningful words and actions that create excitement about the things to come. Do not underestimate Day One's importance. Plan it with great care and make sure it communicates your message, exactly as you want it, to the people you most need to reach.

No two leaders' first days will ever be the same because the combination of variables in every situation begs for different Day One plans. However, when planning your Day One, here are some general guidelines and principles to consider:

It is personal. As a leader, you impact people's lives. These people will try hard to figure out you and your potential impact as soon as they can. They may even rush to judgment. Keep that in mind at all times.

Order counts. Be circumspect about the order in which you meet with people and the timing of when you do what throughout Day One and your early days.

Messages matter. Have a message. Know what you are going to say and not say. Have a bias toward listening. Know that strong opinions, long-winded introductions, and efforts to prove yourself immediately are rarely, if ever, good Day One tactics. People will be looking to form opinions early. Keep that in mind while deciding when to listen, when to share, what to ask, whom to ask, and how you answer. When you speak, keep it brief, on point, and meaningful.

Location counts. Think about where you will show up for work on Day One. Do not just show up at your designated office by default.

Signs and symbols count. Be aware of all the ways in which you communicate, well beyond just words. Think BRAVE!

Timing counts. Day One does not have to match the first day you get paid. Decide which day you want to communicate as Day One to facilitate other choices about order and location.

Tool 3.1 at the end of the chapter provides a convenient checklist for thinking about these things.

The Sierra Club's executive director Michael Brune did a particularly good job of managing his Day One. He thought through his message in advance and then communicated it live, face-to-face, and via social media on his first day so that everyone would know what was on his mind. He smartly used several communication methods to reach a wide range of people in their own preferred ways of communication.

Make Careful Choices about Your Day One Plan

Using the preceding guidelines and your knowledge gained during your Fuzzy Front End, you should be well positioned to start planning how your Day One should take shape. Look for indications of what actions might be especially effective and powerful, and work those items into your agenda, if possible.

Many have found value in holding early meetings with as many of the people in their reporting line as they can muster—in person, by videoconference, by teleconference, or the like. These early meetings give all a chance to lay their eyes on you. It does not really matter what you say in these meetings because no one will remember much beyond hello unless you make a mistake. If they do remember, they'll probably remember the things you wish you'd never said. So, new leaders should say, “Hello, nice to be here,” and not much else at this point.

Another valuable tool is the New Leader Assimilation Session. There is a template for this at the end of this chapter (Tool 3.2). It is easy to deploy and effective in bringing out all the questions that everyone really wants to ask in a forum where a critical mass can hear what you have to say, all at the same time. This prevents person A from filtering the message to person B, who filters it again, and so on.

There will always be rumors. But this process, originally created by Lynn Ulrich of the Wilfred Jarvis Institute and deployed in great depth at General Electric (GE), goes a long way toward squelching most of the rumors, innuendos, and misinformation. Hence, do this as early in your tenure as possible, preferably Day One. The session works in multiple scenarios, including new leaders entering new roles, as well as for new owners in the early days following an acquisition or a new investment by a private equity firm.

You can be creative with this tool, in the event it is not practical to gather all team members in the same location. Martha, whose overarching objective in her new role was to knit together a dispersed team—scattered across 12 states—into a cohesive unit, kicked off her Day One with an all-hands conference call, providing some information and laying out a virtual new leader assimilation process. Everyone was invited to send in comments and questions via e-mail over the next three days. Martha held another all-hands call on Day Four to address the issues. She followed up with regular updates, accomplishing her early goal of getting the entire team on the same page with regard to her objective and approach.

Don't Reinvent the Wheel: Start with This Prototypical Agenda

Although no two executives' Day Ones are ever the same, it's often easier to start with a model.

You can use the following sample agenda as a guideline for crafting your own Day One:

1. Early-morning meeting with your boss to reconfirm and update.
2. Meet and greet over coffee, juice, or the like with broad group to say hello (and not much more).
3. One-on-one meetings as appropriate.
4. New Leader's Assimilation (Tool 3.2) with direct reports and their direct reports.
5. Afternoon activity/meetings/walkabout to reinforce key message.
6. End-of-day cocktails/coffee/social for more informal greetings.
7. Courtesy notes, voice mail for thank-you or follow-up, where needed and appropriate.
8. Brief communication with your boss or board member to begin the habit of staying connected, as appropriate.

Perhaps the best way to get across the power of a well-planned Day One is through examples of others' Day One experiences.

Leverage Your Agenda as a Symbol of What's Important

Edgar was joining a company as chief executive officer (CEO). The most important thing he had to do was to change the mind-set of the organization to become more customer focused.

“What are you doing Day One?”

“I've got this planned. I'm showing up, introducing myself to the team, and launching five committees to tackle the five most important priorities.”

“What happened to being more customer focused?”

“What do you mean?”

“How does your planned Day One demonstrate that your main goal is to become more customer focused?”

“I guess it doesn't.”

“What does it say to your customers?”

“Well, nothing, they won't know about it.”

“Exactly.”

Edgar changed his plans. He did introduce himself to the team, but then explained, “I'm leaving now. Because, before I'm prepared to talk to any of you about anything, I want to get out and spend some time with our customers.”

Edgar then proceeded to talk to customers…for the next 10 days. On the third day, the chairman called him to express his concern. “What are you doing traipsing around the country? I hired you to run the business.”

“I can't do that until I've learned a little about our customers.”

By the end of the first week, customers started calling the chairman to tell him how impressed they were with the new CEO. “He listens. We're excited about him.”

Finally, Edgar came back into the company with a comprehensive understanding of what the customers wanted and knowledge of where his company was falling short. He shared that knowledge with his new team. He met with his direct reports one-on-one to get their perspective on the customers and then used all that information to craft a Burning Imperative around a customer-centric vision.

He took the message forward by calling the top 50 leaders together to tell them how the new company Burning Imperative was crafted with their input as well as the customers'. He explained how the Burning Imperative drove the priorities. He said, “Based on our jointly developed Burning Imperative, I'm happy to announce the formation of five committees to work on our top five priorities.”

Although the top five priorities were essentially the same as he'd originally planned, they contained powerful nuances that better fit the customers' needs, and the initiatives had significantly more credibility because he involved the customers and his staff. His early actions sent a strong communication about the customer's role in the company going forward.

Choose Location, Signs, and Symbols with Care: People Will Notice

Thomas lived in Singapore and joined a large bank as head of its Asia group. He was going to work out of the Singapore office for a few months and then move to its Asia headquarters in Tokyo.

“What are you going to do on Day One?”

“I thought I'd go into the office, do paperwork, and start meeting people.”

“Which office?”

“Singapore.”

“Why?”

“Because I'm here. Why not?”

“Because you're the head of Asia and the Asian headquarters is Tokyo. If you start in Singapore, you'll be perceived as the head of the Singapore branch until you show up in Tokyo in January.”

So, instead of starting in Singapore and doing paperwork, Thomas and his wife flew up to Tokyo and took his direct reports and their spouses out to dinner the night before he started. Then, at 9:00 AM Tokyo time, Thomas arranged a videoconference and introduced himself to his 256 regional employees while standing in the middle of the Tokyo trading floor. Then he met with direct reports during the day. Finally, to cap off his first day, he took the bank's largest customer in Japan out for dinner.

Do you see how these actions represent a big difference in terms of location, signs, and symbols? Everything communicates. Showing up to do paperwork in Singapore sends a different message from showing up and taking charge at the headquarters.

Don't Necessarily Go to Where Your Boss Is

Gerry was starting work in London, but most of his direct reports were in a newly acquired company in Birmingham. During his Fuzzy Front End, Gerry learned that the Birmingham folks were concerned that they would be required to move to London because of the merger. That wasn't the case, but Gerry realized that it could become a crippling fear. So he chose to spend Day One in Birmingham to ease people's fears and to address the rumors up front. He used the New Leader's Assimilation tool to extract the common fears of the Birmingham group and went in with a strong and credible message that their jobs and their location were safe. To further underscore the message, he set up an office that was complete and functional and hired a secretary at the Birmingham office before his Day One meetings.

On the other hand, Khalil was coming in to run three divisions of a different company. The largest was in Odessa near where he lived. The second largest was in Omaha, and the smallest was in Lawrence. His boss's office was in Lawrence. Khalil chose to spend Day One in Lawrence, attending his boss's staff meeting in the morning and then spending the afternoon with the division that reported to him. For Khalil, it was important to signal to his boss that, even though he was living in Odessa, he was going to be available to be part of his boss's team.

Leverage Your Message on Day One

Karen was coming into a bank to merge three divisions into one.

“How are you going to get to know the people at each division?”

“I'm in luck. Each division manager has an off-site meeting already planned for my first two weeks. I'm going to use those as a chance to meet the key players and get to know them.”

“Will that be the first time you meet them?”

“Sure, why not?”

“Because it doesn't match with your main objective or your message.”

The problem was that Karen's individual divisional meetings perpetuated the culture of three different divisions as opposed to one combined group. Each of the divisions was in proximity to each other. So to set a new course Karen rented a theater for Day One and invited the entire staff across all the old divisions. Then she introduced herself to the entire staff of the new division at the same time. She followed this with a social event designed to get the three divisions mingling.

She eventually went to the old divisions' off-sites, but only after setting the stage for the new combined division.

Be Present

Kim was coming into a new company as CEO. The old CEO and founder was going to stay on as chief innovation officer.

“Tell me about Day One.”

“Oh, I'm all set. I am going to get in early to get my office set up. Then I am meeting with the old CEO from 9:00 to 11:00. Then meeting with the CFO [chief financial officer] from 11:00 to 12:00. After lunch I'm going to take care of some logistics and work on my messaging for my first official communication with the company.”

“Are you a hermit?”

“What a silly question. Of course not.”

“Well, if I work for you and if I haven't seen you by noon of your first day I'm pretty convinced you're either a hermit, or shy, or are not too concerned about ‘us’ since all you've done is lock yourself in your office.”

Instead, Kim called a meeting of the company's top 100 managers at 8:30. She introduced herself, told everyone how glad she was to be there. She then had meetings with the old CEO and CFO. But, at this point, it was okay because she'd made an initial connection with her team.

Be Mindful of the Unintended Consequences

Arthur was moving from California to Montana to head up human resources at a large corporation. When asked what he was doing Day One, he suggested he was going to spend it in a human resources orientation. Most companies' human resource orientations are not something a senior executive should do on Day One. Almost always, that is best done during the Fuzzy Front End. But since Arthur was coming in to head human resources (HR), this was different. He needed to be there.

In the end, Arthur pushed back his official Day One so that he could go up to Montana a week early. He used that created time to meet with most of his key stakeholders. On his official Day One, he sat through every minute of the HR orientation, allowing no interruptions. It sent a message to his team that HR was indeed important, and it allowed him to have an informed opinion of the orientation process and how it needed to change.

At the end of his Day One, Arthur bumped into the CEO, who asked him how things were going so far. Arthur told him about the premeetings with peers and his teams as well as his positive impressions of the HR orientation. The CEO could not figure out how Arthur had gotten all that done in just one day.

Dress to Fit In

Victor got invited to a meeting at a golf club on a Saturday morning. He was told that the dress was business casual. But he was in Japan, so he suspected that might mean something a little different. He wore gray flannels, a formal shirt, and a blazer. As it turned out, he was the only one not in a suit and tie.

Conversely, Dave joined a company where people dressed casually—jeans, shorts, flip-flops, T-shirts—even to the most formal meetings. He noticed the casual clothes during his Fuzzy Front End, but still decided to show up in a suit on Day One because he thought it signified leadership. After two months, he was still wearing a suit to work. No tie, but the suit trousers and jacket. People thought he was clinging to the armor of his old ways and that he was turned off or disapproving of the new culture. His direct reports even referred to him as “The Suit.” He should have lost the suit before Day One.

Think carefully about Day One. Think about how you want to learn and communicate. Do you want to start by meeting your team in the office or off-site? Should your meetings be structured as one-on-ones or as a group? Do you want to start with a full-company meeting? Do you want to start with casual meetings? Do you want to start with the team or with customers? From the preceding examples, you can deduce that there is no one right answer. But just by asking yourself the questions and answering thoughtfully, you will be miles ahead of the game.

What Not to Do on Day One

1. Don't leave to look for an apartment or home.
2. Don't show up late.
3. Don't have lunch meetings with former colleagues.
4. Don't consume alcohol at lunch.
5. Don't tell anything but the mildest joke.
6. Don't spend excessive time on the phone setting up logistics for your move.
7. Don't dress inappropriately.
8. Don't decorate your office.
9. Don't say anything (good or bad) about your former company.
10. Don't say anything negative about anybody in your new company.
11. Don't use a PowerPoint presentation to introduce yourself.
12. Don't schedule a doctor's appointment.
13. Don't tell too much information about your personal life.
14. Don't panic if things go awry.

Take Control of Day One: Summary and Implications

At the start of a new role, everything is magnified. Thus it is critical to be particularly thoughtful about everything you do and say and don't do and don't say—and what order you do or say them in.

As you plan your own Day One, here are a couple of things to keep in mind:

• It is personal. As a leader, you impact people's lives. Those people will try very hard to figure out you and your potential impact as soon as they can. They may even rush to judgment. Keep that in mind at all times.
• Order counts. Be circumspect about the order in which you meet with people and the timing of when you do what throughout Day One and your early days.
• Messages matter. Have a message. Know what you are going to say and not say. Have a bias toward listening. Know that strong opinions, long-winded introductions, and efforts to prove yourself immediately are rarely, if ever, good Day One tactics. People will be looking to form opinions early. Keep that in mind while deciding when to listen, when to share, what to ask, whom to ask, and how you answer. When speaking keep it brief, on point, and meaningful.
• Location counts. Think about where you will show up for work on Day One. Do not just show up at your designated office by default.
• Signs and symbols count. Be aware of all the ways in which you communicate, well beyond just words.
• Timing counts. Day One does not have to match the first day you get paid. Decide which day you want to communicate as Day One to facilitate other choices about order and location.