How to Prepare for (and Land) a Management Position
Landing your first management job is a chicken-and-egg problem. The bottom line is that you need management experience to get into a management role. The good news is that you don’t need the manager title to gain relevant experience. You can start right now, in whatever role you are in to gain valuable management skills that qualify you for your first official role.
Communicate Your Plan Early and Often
There is no way you can transition your career into management if you do not let people know that it’s part of your plan. The single most valuable thing you can do is tell your boss that you are looking for a management position. Whether you like it or not, you won't be in the room making the decision about who fills the next open spot so if your own manager can't go to bat for you, there's almost zero chance you'll get that opportunity.
If you're not already having consistent career discussions with your boys where your can make your own goals known, start them now. Any good manager will be open to semi-annual or quarterly meetings where you can step back from your day-to-day work and share your high level goals and get feedback on how you're performing against in your current responsibilities.
Email your skip level manager (your bosses boss) and ask if they would be open to occasional career development conversations. Tell them you plan. Ask them what they would do in your position. Listen to what they say and include that in your plans. When you meet the next time, follow up and share with them the action you’ve taken. Tell them again that you want to manage. And then tell them again.
Know What is Expected of Managers
If you are planning to move into management, you better know what you are getting into. Talk to managers—your own, others in neighboring organizations, those in different companies, those in different industries—and find out what they do. Take stock of what will be expected of you and weigh that against your own skills and interests. Start to identify what you do well and what you might need to work on. Look for ways to self-educate yourself on your weaknesses so they don’t become a stumbling block, but more importantly, seek out projects that accentuate your strengths. You don’t need to be superhuman at everything. But if you do a few things exceptionally well, it’s enough to get you the recognition you need to progress.
Start Right Where You Are
You might think that you can’t become a manager until you are given the title. Before you can even think about getting a promotion you have to ask yourself one question—am I good at my job. If you aren’t standing out in the work that you’re doing as an individual contributor on a project, no one will trust you to manage an entire team of individuals. If you have any performance feedback from you leaders, focus on that and prove that you can take the constructive feedback and enact change! The rest of this article will be useless information if you can’t deliver on the key responsibilities of your current function.
The next reality to face is that most managers will take on many of those responsibilities well before they are given the title to match them. That’s the unfortunately reality of most corporate jobs. You have to do the job you want before it’s given to you. At the very least, you can do that within your own responsibilities. Plan out your work and deliver it on time to your boss. Proactively solve problems before they become a fire drill. Take on extra work when your team members are falling behind. Point out problems (not blame) to your manager so it can be planned for and made a non-issue.
Expand Your Sphere of Influence
Now that you are absolutely killing it in your current role, it’s time to elevate those around you. Be the one to bring together the two or three people most involved in the area of the project you are responsible for and make sure they are all actively communicating with each other. If they are in your same function, teach them the methods you are using to be successful in your current role. If you they are cross-functional team members, ensure that they know what is coming around the corner and help plan and implement a solution ahead of time. Proactively start your work so you aren’t caught unprepared when your boss wants to discuss the next steps in the project. Good leaders help those around them to perform at a higher level, and nothing shows you are more prepared for formal leadership than doing that on your own initiative.
Mentorship
Much of management focuses on mentoring those around you. Find and volunteer for mentorship opportunities within your company. If you have a new employee joining your team, ask if you can be their work buddy or integration guide. Show them the ropes of the company and help them succeed. Is your team hiring an intern? Ask if you can manage the hiring process and be responsible for the intern during the summer or semester they are working with you. If neither of those opportunities are coming anytime soon, look for internal clubs or Employee Resource Groups that you can join and start mentoring others. These relationships don’t need to be formal ones where you are assigned, but you can simply make a point of being available to help another team members who consistently needs help connecting to the nearest printer in the office. Do this kind of thing often enough, and you’ll be seen as someone who goes out of their way to guarantee the team’s success.
Initiative and Leadership
Management is often mistaken for leadership, but the critical thing to know is that leaders are found everywhere. You don’t have to have any title or official position to be a leader in your organization. Just by executing on the key deliverables of your current role you lead by example to those with the same responsibilities. Taking initiative is one of the most obvious forms of leadership and it requires no title or position. Be the person to take initiative and volunteer for a job that needs doing. Be the person who takes initiative and solves a problem that needs solving. Be the person who takes initiative a creates a tool to streamline a task that gets repeated frequently on your team. Take the initiative and work out a new process to make your team more efficient at something you do regularly. All these forms of initiative will demonstrate your leadership skills.
Cover for Your Boss
When your boss is going on vacation, offer to cover for them in a meeting or to prepare one of their deliverables while they are out. Even if you aren’t given authority to make decisions and and answer every question that might come at you while they’re out, you can take detailed notes and provide recommended actions to give them a leg up on catching up when they get back. If you do the job well, you’re more likely to get asked to do it again when the opportunity arises. When your boss—and others—see you doing that job well, you are demonstrating the fact that you are capable and trusted. Both are necessary for the eventual transition to management.
Sponsorship
All of these previous steps are intended for two purposes.
To build the skills and capabilities of a manager in yourself
Build your manager’s confidence in you so they become your sponsor
While you may think that the first is more important, it’s absolutely meaningless if you don’t have a sponsor who will go to bat for you at the opportune moment. If your manager is willing to speak up and say “I have a great person in mind” when that new management position opens up, that is more powerful than whatever resume you can throw together, especially when you don’t have any formal management experience. A trusted leader who vouches for you is the most powerful currency in your quest to make this transition.
Ask When the Opportunity Arises
“You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.”
If you don’t ask, it will never happen. Hopefully your company is organized enough to post the job so you can officially apply and make your intentions clear. If not, you have to speak up and share you desire to take up the new position. If you’ve read this post and followed the very first piece of advice, it won’t be any surprise to those in charge that you are interested. When they ask why you are qualified, walk them through all the things you have done to prepare yourself. At this point, you will have the experiences to back up your claim that you are qualified to jump into management.
There can be hurdles to getting internal promotions into management. Your leadership may refuse to see you as something other than that green recruit right out of school or you may be too valuable in your current positions (one of the barriers to gaining more control in your career) and they don’t want to lose you. If that’s the case, you may have to take your hard won experiences with you to another company. Chances are, you’ll be better of for it in the end either way. Just don’t forget to brush up on your interview skills before the big day!
New Horizons
Management is challenging and rewarding. It may not be for everyone, but by following the steps outlined in this article you can build your own skills and the confidence of the leaders who you need to buy-in to the idea of you as a leader. When you make the transition to management you’ll be embarking on a whole new adventure and a brand new set of challenges and opportunities.
