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A 30-60-90 day plan for a leadership position is a strategic plan which helps a new leader about the first 90 days of what is going to be done. who to connect with next 30 days will be you have to focus and what problems you need to understand and what action will be taken.
Understanding the leadership role is not enough. You need to understand working style, company goals, current processes, business challenges and stakeholders’ expectations. That is why it is important you have to divide the 90-day plan.
Generally, what you have to do in the first 30 days is focus on learning and listening. In the next 30 days, you have to focus on aligning and improving. In the last 30 days you have to focus on execution and leadership, with this approach you as a new leader understand the situation with changes and make informed decisions later.
Why Do Leaders Need a 30-60-90 Day Plan?
If you are starting your leadership role without the right approach it takes you in the wrong way. You can start with this approach
- Set clear priorities
New leadership comes with lots of task and 30-60-90 day plan help to decide what is important and which issues can be handled later
- Understand the team
Understanding the team is more important in strong leadership like in the first 30 days you can take one-on-one meetings to understand employee challenges, workload, career, goals and concerns.
- Preventing you from making wrong changes
It helps you avoid making changes instantly, it helps you understand the plan first and then make informed decisions.
- Builds Trust
Team members feel more comfortable when the leader listens to them carefully. You can build trust by conducting meetings and regular communication via messages and emails.
- Align team with business goals
A leader and team members support business goals and with a 30-60-90-day plan you review KPIs, OKRs and setting departmental priorities.
- Manager and senior leaders get clear visibility
With a structured plan a new leader knows what they are working on, what progress and what the next priority will be because this will make it clear at an early stage.
What Should a Leadership 30-60-90 Day Plan Include?
An effective leadership onboarding plan should include relationship building and operational discovery and four pillars must be included
- Learning goals
Team culture, internal tools, operational history and deeply understand the market position.
- People and relationships goals
Making strong relationships through one-on-one meetings with direct reports, peers, cross-functional partners and executive sponsors
- Operational goals
Identifying bottlenecks, reviewing budgets, checking workflow and evaluate current tech stack
- Identify Quick Wins
After understanding the main challenges during the first month, leaders can choose one or two low risk improvements during the second month and these quick wins can show progress while building team confidence.
First 30 Days: Learn, Listen & Understand
The main goals of first 30 days you should understand the problems and identify the real reasons of problems
- Meet your teams
Schedule one-on-one meetings with all employees and you can ask questions like what are your current priorities, which task is most challenging, which process you want to improve and what support you need from me as a manager.
- Meet with stakeholders
Schedule meetings with sales, product, finance and HR teams and understand who they work with in other teams. Take feedback for their expectations and current problems
- Audit processes and tools
Review team documentation, SOPs, software licenses and project management boards.
- Review team performance metrics
Analyze historical reports, customer feedback, budget sheets and previous quarterly deliverables
Days 31–60: Build, Improve & Take Action
In the second month leaders can move from observation to taking action. In the first month leaders collect that information then convert it into practical improvements.
- Synthesize Findings
You have to divide common issues into categories like communication gaps, process bottlenecks, workload problems, role confusion, tool and technology issues.
- Secure Quick Wins
clarifying ownership and teams can see clear improvements like removing unnecessary meetings, clearing ownership, making the reporting process simple and set a clear communication process.
- Evaluate team structure
Check whether responsibilities are divided equally between employees like if there is any unnecessary workload, employees understand their responsibilities. Roles and responsibilities are clear
- Align on quarterly priorities
Discuss with your manager and align the team with goals like team should focus on which goal, how to measure success and which task can be postponed.
Days 61–90: Execute, Measure & Lead
In the final month you have moved into a proactive leadership role and you have an execution plan for long term
- Launch strategic projects
You have to launch major process updates, new hiring plans and project roadmaps.
- Establish regular feedback rhythms
Make them an important part of weekly team meetings, one on one meetings and monthly performance reviews.
- Optimize resource allocation
Allocate the budget properly, balance team workload and remove skill gaps through training sessions.
- Measure baseline performance
Track initial 90-day goals against the starting point and share progress with executives.
30-60-90 Day Plan for a Director or Senior Leadership Position
| Days | Focus | Actions | Outcome |
|---|---|---|---|
| First 30 days | Organizational discovery | Schedule meetings with all departmental managers and understand the team’s current work | You know what the problems are and challenges in every team |
| Second 30 days | Identify problems and reduce them | Problems you find in first 30 days you should make plans to solve them | Important problems should be clear, and improvement moves in the right direction |
| Third 30 days | Act and lead the team | Implement important workflow changes and remove gaps | Teamwork is more organized, and management gets a clear view of performance |
What Goals Should You Set in a Leadership 30-60-90 Day Plan?
To maintain balance you should divide your leadership objectives into three clear areas.
Learning goals
Read existing SOPs, complete compliance training, review last four quarters of financial or operational performance and also map customer journeys
Initiative Goals
Fix handoff between 2 or 3 teams, update outdated tracking tools and keep them properly documented.
Personal goals
Establish relationships with three executive mentors, set clear communication boundaries and develop good relationships with every team member.
How to Make Leadership Goals Measurable
Improving team communication and understanding the product is difficult to measure. You can use the SMART framework and connect them with clear measurable metrics.
Use clear numbers
By adding numbers in goals you can track them easily.
Add clear deadlines
You have to make deadlines for every goal because in a 30-60-90-day plan it is better to set deadlines in every phase of the goal.
Set measurable results
If you want to improve employee performance and process you should define improvements in numbers.
Measure team alignment
Task completion is not enough of a sign of leadership. You should understand team priorities and goals.
Review goals regularly
Do not stop after setting the goals you should check progress at the end of phase and you should use simple formula “Action + Number + Deadline + Expected Result”
Common Mistakes to Avoid in a 30-60-90 Day Leadership Plan
A 30-60-90-day leadership plan becomes successful when goals are real and according to role but some leaders make mistakes due to the excitement of a new leadership role
- Changing things too quickly even before getting full information.
- Setting too many goals at the same time to achieve them
- Ignoring team problems in the workplace
- Working without feedback
- Ignoring existing data, making decisions based on opinions and ignoring performance data
- Not planning beyond 90 days. If you plan only until the end of 90 days is not enough because you miss long-term direction.
How to Measure the Success of Your First 90 Days as a leader
● Check team feedback and trust and ask simple questions like communication is improved or not, are employees sharing information openly or not and what you should start or stop
● Measure your original 90-day goals and review them after 90 days and check the status of every goal like completed, in progress, delayed or not started
● Compare team performance with your starting point and compare relevant metrics like project completion rate, deadline performance, employee productivity and customer response time
● Check operational stability, your team works smoothly without your daily involvement and this is a good sign of leadership
● Track employee work for the first 90 days like employee productivity, attendance, idle time, application usage and user activity during working hours.
if you want track employee work according your 30-60-90 days plan contact our support team.
Plan with Purpose. Measure Progress. Lead Better.