On the upside, it’s a time when the company is inclined to cut you a little slack. You can and should take the time to perform a solid assessment of marketing programs, processes and people before jumping in with your ideas. Imposing your own ideas before you adequately understand the inner workings of an organization can cause you to burn bridges you never intended to burn, make mistakes that are hard to unravel, and waste valuable time.
On the downside, in your first few months in your new role everyone will have an opinion of what’s wrong and what you should do about it – and they’ll be more than happy to share.
Actually, that’s not as much of a downside as it may seem when they have you cornered in a conference room with their list of “suggestions” in hand. These opinions from all levels within the company can give you excellent insights into how things work and the human element (a.k.a. politics) of an organization. If you combine this information with your own assessment of how things are working you’ll get a more complete picture.
Instead of pushing away these ideas, why not court them? Listen to the ideas, try to understand what problem the individual is trying to solve, and ask questions about how they came to their conclusions. Done right and you’ll have plenty of allies that will stand behind your programs. Best of all, you never know where the next great suggestion is going to come from.
All the best!
Melissa
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