Your biggest challenge will be earning their respect. They’re not your coworkers anymore - they are your team members.

Two things will happen:

1. Your former coworkers will try to get away with things because they think you’re cool. It’s tempting to give into that. But you’ll learn very quickly this is favoritism, and it will be to the detriment of everyone

2. You’ll make decisions that former coworkers will not like. They will go behind your back and say “former boss would have done it this way.” Or “Why should I listen to you?”

That’s why you have to earn their respect from day one. Let them know you have their back - and you’re their defense attorney. But also let them know what your expectations are.

Give positive feedback when you see them doing something that you like, or that they did well. Thank your team OFTEN and make sure they know when they’re doing a great job. It’s very easy to have a “no news is good news” attitude as a manager, and I’m guilty of it myself; but they need to hear these things. Otherwise you get burnout, you get imposter syndrome

Giving negative feedback is hard… but sometimes you gotta do it. Avoiding negative feedback will only be to their detriment - if they’re doing something wrong, they need to know, so they can be given a chance to correct it

Your standard will be higher now. If you’re looking at your phone, your team will notice. If you’re late, your team will notice. If you dip out early Friday, or show up hungover after Super Bowl Sunday… your team will notice. Always lead by example

If you make a mistake, own up the mistake, but don’t harp on it too much. That will only encourage others to focus on your error, instead of your solution. Approach things in a solution focused way.