The Art of Inheritance – Get It Wrong and You’ve Lost Before You’ve Even Started

When you join a new organisation or you are promoted to a leadership position you will often inherit a team that is already in place. They will certainly have far more experience of the nuances and intricacies of the organisation than you have. They might have low morale, they might be demotivated, and they might already be looking to jump ship at the earliest practicable opportunity.

Therein lies a challenge for you as their new leader. There is always the option to just break apart what you’ve found and bring in your own trusted lieutenants, but that is the easy way out. There is an art to working with what you have inherited.

It all boils down to building trust. Your team need to know they can trust you to lead them through the good and the bad. 

Conversely, you need to know you have people in your team you can rely on – especially as you are in unfamiliar surroundings – learning about a new organisation whilst starting to prepare your game plan to bring about successful change.

I am a big believer in creating a shared vision and purpose for your team. It shows what your expectations are, and it gives everyone something to come together to achieve. But, you can’t do this until that two-way trust has been established.

Often, leaders, particularly inexperienced ones, will be afraid to embrace contradictory views. It’s easier to just surround yourself with those that agree with your every word but this is a critical mistake. Those opposite views will actually inform your decision making and by listening to and hearing them out you will start to build trust.

I have experienced first hand more than one leader that was unable to work with what they inherited, and by not even attempting to build trust, or forgiving mistakes, they destroyed the morale of their teams and ultimately failed in what they set out to do.

Learning the art of inheriting a team is one of the most important skills needed in the modern workplace – get it wrong and you’ve lost before you’ve even started.