The Making of a Manager: What to Do When Everyone Looks to You
Author: Julie Zhuo
Publisher: Portfolio
Goodreads | The StoryGraph
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Cover Description
Leading a team for the first time is a daunting new endeavor. Facebook's Vice President of Product Design Julie Zhuo presents a bold new guide to getting respect--and results--in your new managerial role.
Julie Zhuo remembers the meeting where she was asked to become a manager. As in, convince her peers that she deserved to be in charge of all of them. She was 25. She barely had any experience being managed, let alone managing others. But hey, what could go wrong?
As it turns out, Julie had a lot to learn. Like most first-time managers, she was thrown straight into the deep end, with little to guide her. What followed was a series of anxiety-inducing firsts, from her first time agonizing over whether an interviewee was a good fit for her team, her first time building trust with a report who was more experienced than she was, and her first time firing someone she liked. In this accessible, friendly guide, she reveals what she learned the hard way:
Why you should give continuous feedback, instead of waiting for performance reviews
Why you shouldn't deliver critical feedback in a "compliment sandwich"
Why you should stop trying to impress your manager, and start asking for help with your thorniest problems
If you are a new manager, looking to be promoted, or even in your first decade or so of managing, this is a practical guide to navigating the often-choppy waters.
Review
I borrowed the audiobook of The Making of a Manager from my library after I found out that I was going to become a manager for the first time — I’d googled some recommendations for first-time managers, and it led me here. I’m glad it did!
This book is a helpful, friendly, useful book specifically for people who are becoming managers for the first time. Julie Zhou was thrust into a manager role at a young age and learned by doing, so she wrote the book she wished she’d had then. It was exactly what I needed — things to look out for, how to think about your newfound responsibility for someone else’s career, and tangible advice for holding meetings, giving feedback, etc.
Thank you Julie!