The difficulty of AD, promoted as manager in the old team: his main concern was that he will not be able to impose as manager believing that it “is hard to be the head of the colleagues which before the promotion, were your friends’’.
The approach of the difficulty: I've helped AD to see the difference between his roles, before and after promotion, and the roles of the colleagues, before and after his promotion, and the related types of relationships.
By detailing each team member role and observation of what is different AD could see the big picture of the situation.
It was an essential CLARIFICATION that has determined AD to say: ”my fear that I will not be able to face this, comes from the fact that I often get these relationships mixed up and I’m feeling bad to ask them to do certain things in the interest of the business’’.
I asked him what he really wants to be a ”popular" manager or an ''efficient" manager?
AD's answer was a very clear one: an ”efficient" manager. Knowing what he wants, it was not difficult to determine together what he has to do to get what he desires.
The achieved result: AD realized that his concern that he will not be able to take on the new challenge was in his imagination and a clear definition of roles and relationships between him and his colleagues made him to be the efficient and agreed manager by the team because each of team members felt valued and important in achieving objectives and in the future development of the held position.