Why Slowing Down Was the Boldest Move I Made as a New Leader

The first query individuals ask while you tackle a brand new management position is often some model of “What’s your plan?”

It is a good query. When you’re new, there’s a pure temptation to show your worth by displaying up with fast solutions, or a listing of belongings you plan to repair. I’ve discovered that there’s a higher place to begin.

I’m early on in my position at BILL. The questions I preserve coming again to in these first three months are how do I need my first days, weeks and months to look. Where ought to I spend my time and why?  How do I strip away noise and “get to signal” rapidly?  How do I create proximity to the purchasers and to groups with out slowing down the group’s work? These are issues an entrepreneur is confronted with daily, whether or not they’re entering into a brand new position, rising a crew or navigating a altering market.

Every chief is tempted to carry their playbook. In my opinion, playbooks are a point-in-time illustration of how issues had been completed — maybe in a unique firm, at a unique time. 2026 is wildly totally different from even 2025, not to mention 2020. We must leverage the teachings from our previous whereas constructing for the longer term, backed by trendy applied sciences and buyer expectations.

In a brand new position, credibility comes from being clear about what you wish to accomplish and getting within the trenches. It comes from studying the enterprise, understanding individuals’s day-to-day, and the shopper pains that assist inform a go-forward plan. Your job is to take heed to the individuals closest to the shopper and the work, determine the obstacles stopping them from transferring quicker, and empower them.

I imagine it’s necessary to rethink the attainable, however change for the sake of change isn’t useful.  With AI evolving as rapidly as it’s, there’s extra at stake. AI is reshaping what groups can accomplish, and markets and buyer expectations can change rapidly. The manner I give it some thought is: How can we prioritize, sequence and produce the group alongside on the journey?

Here are 5 rules I’m utilizing to study earlier than I lead:

1. Question outdated assumptions, and check your individual.

Past choices ought to inform however not decide current decisions. The choices that had been proper a 12 months in the past, and even six months in the past, will not be proper now. The mindset ought to be: What is working nicely at this time? Where are clients encountering friction? Where do groups duplicate work? Which assumptions about the best way we function are based mostly on present actuality and which of them are merely holdovers?

That doesn’t imply each determination made earlier than you arrived is incorrect, simply don’t depend on the previous to make go-forward choices.

2. Diagnose earlier than you resolve.

As a sensible working self-discipline, remark earlier than motion is important. Finding what’s value holding is simply as necessary as discovering out what’s lacking or must evolve. A brand new course of or organizational change might finally be essential, however assess the necessity first. Ask: What drawback are we attempting to unravel? What does the group and the shopper really need? And may know-how assist us deal with it extra successfully? This is one place the place expertise actually can rely. I just lately instituted a forecasting course of that didn’t exist earlier than. Its absence puzzled me, and expertise advised me it was vital to the corporate’s future success.

3. Let specialists be specialists

Your position is to construct, align and empower a crew, not be the area skilled in each space. In the previous, I’ve had jobs the place I wanted area experience, however the larger and extra complicated a management position turns into, the extra it’s important to let that go. A brand new chief earns belief by recognizing the experience already contained in the group and making it clear that useful leaders have actual possession.

4. Be candid about what you don’t but know.

Credibility doesn’t require projecting complete certainty. It requires being trustworthy about the place you have to study and displaying that you’ve got a disciplined manner to take action. In a task this broad, which means constructing and aligning the crew whereas empowering the individuals closest to every area to guide with their experience.

My duty is to carry these views collectively, assist the crew work towards its greatest and create the situations for us to succeed collectively.

I exploit AI as a second mind. As I used to be beginning at BILL, I acquired lots of of paperwork, together with board decks and inner supplies. Leveraging them, I used our major AI device to construct role-specific assets to assist me function. It wasn’t troublesome, and I now use AI as a second voice that helps me sift by means of and recall giant volumes of data. It’s one thing that you should utilize to strategize and validate alongside. There’s rather a lot to recollect, and AI can actually be a buddy in that regard. I can use it to rapidly revisit the historical past of an initiative, make clear an acronym or remind myself of the strategic rationale behind a call.

Key takeaway

The first weeks in a brand new position will not be about proving that you’ve got each reply. They are about creating the situations for higher solutions: getting near the shopper, studying from the individuals who know the work greatest, difficult assumptions and being deliberate about the place to behave.

You can’t wait perpetually to make choices, however velocity for velocity’s sake isn’t prudent, so decelerate a bit originally earlier than you begin to dash. In a market transferring as rapidly as this one, the leaders who can be best are those who study quick, ask arduous questions and provides their groups the readability and confidence to maneuver ahead collectively.

The first query individuals ask while you tackle a brand new management position is often some model of “What’s your plan?”

It is a good query. When you’re new, there’s a pure temptation to show your worth by displaying up with fast solutions, or a listing of belongings you plan to repair. I’ve discovered that there’s a higher place to begin.

I’m early on in my position at BILL. The questions I preserve coming again to in these first three months are how do I need my first days, weeks and months to look. Where ought to I spend my time and why?  How do I strip away noise and “get to signal” rapidly?  How do I create proximity to the purchasers and to groups with out slowing down the group’s work? These are issues an entrepreneur is confronted with daily, whether or not they’re entering into a brand new position, rising a crew or navigating a altering market.