Welcome back to the Look and Sound of Leadership, an ongoing series of

executive coaching tips designed to help you be perceived in the workplace

the way you want to be perceived.

I'm Tom Henschel, your executive coach, and today we're talking about managing former peers. Neil had been competing for a promotion and had gotten it at last.

Sharing the news with me during one of our coaching sessions, he wasn't all that happy.

Look what's about to happen, he said.

He gave me a knowing look and said,

Olga and Ashraf, I'm going to have to be their boss. They were hard enough to deal with

when they were my peers. Olga had often come to Neil whispering about some conspiracy or other trying to win him to her side.

Neil saw her as self-serving and untrustworthy.

Ashraf talked anywhere people would listen. He often made public statements that were

inaccurate or inappropriate resulting in much drama. Neil felt he should be

reined in. I asked Neil what's your biggest concern? He said, people are going to be upset. Not

just Olgan Ashraf, there's Ron. He has to be pissed. I beat him out for the job. I'm sure there are others too

I nodded in sympathy and what's your biggest concern about people being upset? I just want to do the work, he said. And there's a lot of work to do. If

everyone's upset, the work's going to go to hell. I know this place. When people are upset,

productivity goes down. What's your biggest concern about that? I asked.

Well, how's it going to look? I step into the role and productivity goes down?

I think it would look completely normal, I said.

It's a big change. It's the J-curve. Things get worse before they get better, and people

have feelings about it all. That's normal. Well, I don't want it to be my normal, he said.

I want people to settle down and get to work. I shook my head

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