Turnaround Leader’s First 6 Steps

The Leader’s First 6 Steps

• Select a team for the turnaround and listen to them. Find out who the opinion leaders are in the office. You need to get a peer group together that can hold each other accountable. Start listening to the people (at all levels) closest to the situation, as they will have great ideas for what the problems are. Consider though, if they knew how to do what is needed, they would most likely have already done it. Your coaching and consistency is important here.
• Get a good understanding of who knows the clients, backlog and status of financials. Ask lots of questions to try and get the most accurate picture of the health of the office – all aspects: people, ongoing work profitability, client satisfaction, market share, accounts receivable, etc.
• Watch for dysfunctional habits and set up the norms of the team. Usually in turnarounds the gossip and blame is running pretty high. Additionally the victim mentality of why this “has happened to us” is a common mantra of the “survivors”. Those habits are unhealthy and you need to get begin now to change the culture, as those habits will not get you where you want to be. Leadership has to call out the bad behaviors and model the good ones. Additionally, norms for how you will work together need to be discussed early on and managed. What your expectations are, what type of tracking you need, what to do if they run into a problem and how issues will be addressed and by whom.
• Be frank and factual as you share the extent of the problem with the turnaround team. The faster you can share the real status, the better. Why? Because they are no longer worried that you will “find out” how bad it really is. You already know and together you will build a strategy to turn around the office. The larger team should also be kept apprised; it’s always better to inform them when there are action steps employed to ‚¬Ëœright the ship’. Communication is critical because, in the absence of actual data, people will make up what is going on, so be upfront and regular in your updates and communications.
• Divide up the roles and assign responsibilities and tasks with due dates. At this point the leaders need to get the team going on priorities and expectations. Make sure all assignments and action items are in writing, because with writing comes accountability. “We will look at finances today and come up with actions and we will discuss progress next Tuesday”. When next Tuesday comes around you must validate – in a group of peers – what has (or hasn’t) been done. Your job as leader is to make sure the culture of “can do” is alive and well. Urgency is essential.
• Point out when the team or any member does the right thing and where progress is being made. The same peer group that holds each other accountable is the team in front of which members want to be most acknowledged. When the team is making progress make sure you point it out and celebrate those successes along the way.

Turnarounds take time and a heavy dose of involvement, consistency and coaching from leadership! People will be watching to see if you believe in the turnaround and they need to see you vested 100% in the collective recovery strategy, that buy-in is how you will get 100% level of commitment from your turnaround team.