Promoted to manager? Here is exactly what to do in your first 90 days
New Manager, Week One turns a strong individual contributor into a trusted team lead, with a week-by-week plan, ready-to-use scripts and an honest guide to using AI as a co-pilot for the admin, never for the human parts.
- A three-phase 90-day plan with a printable template, so you know what to focus on each week
- More than 50 one-to-one questions and a simple agenda your team will actually look forward to
- The original NOTE feedback model plus word-for-word scripts for praise, correction and difficult conversations
- A five-level delegation ladder, a delegation planner and a traffic-light rule for what never goes into AI
New Manager, Week One · Bodhih Professional Playbooks · 04 by Bodhih Training, trainers to 2,000+ companies since 2008.
What should a first-time manager do in the first 90 days?
Spend month one listening: hold a 1:1 with every team member, learn the real work and agree success measures with your manager. In month two, share themes and test one or two small wins. In month three, set goals, delegate deliberately and ask for feedback. New Manager, Week One by Bodhih Training sets out this plan with templates and scripts.
You already know the problem. Here is what it costs you.
You were great at the work, and now nobody tells you what the job is
You were promoted for your expertise, then handed a team, an inbox full of other people's problems and no manual. You keep fixing things yourself because it is faster, and you are working later than ever.
Your friends are now your team
Yesterday you were complaining about the process together. Today you approve their leave and will write their reviews. Be too friendly and you cannot have a hard conversation; be too distant and they say the title changed you.
Feedback and performance conversations feel impossible
You hint, soften and wait for the quarterly review, hoping the problem will sort itself out. It rarely does, and the longer you wait, the harder it gets for everyone.
AI looks like a shortcut, and a risk
You know an AI assistant could save you hours on reviews, agendas and plans. You are less sure what you are allowed to paste into it, or how to keep your voice and judgement in what you send.
Picture yourself a few weeks from now.
Imagine next Monday. Instead of opening your inbox and reacting, you open a simple plan that tells you this week is about listening. You have six 30-minute conversations booked, each with a shared document and three good questions ready. By Friday you know more about your team than your predecessor learned in a year.
Now picture your first difficult conversation. You have three specific examples written down, a clear expectation and an offer of support. You open calmly, you ask what is getting in the way, and you actually listen. As you start using the scripts in this book, you will notice those conversations getting shorter, kinder and far more useful.
Think about your next weekly update to your boss: three headings, fifteen minutes, your team's names next to their wins. Think about the next time someone hands you a problem and you ask what options they have considered, and then watch them solve it themselves.
And picture day 90. You sit down with your manager and walk through a one-page look-back: what you learned, what you changed, what comes next. You are not pretending to be confident any more. You simply know what you are doing, and your team can tell.
Chapter by chapter
Every chapter starts with a real situation, gives you a method, and ends with something to do today.
- Format
- PDF eBook
- Length
- 83 pages, about 15,000 words
- Chapters
- 12 chapters, introduction, conclusion and 4 appendices
- Reading time
- About 4 hours
- Includes
- 90-day plan template, 55 one-to-one questions, feedback scripts, delegation planner, AI prompts, 6 illustrations
- Best for
- First-time managers, new team leads and HR or L&D teams supporting them
Introduction: The Email That Changes Everything
Why strong individual contributors struggle in their first management role, and the one AI rule that runs through the whole book.
Chapter 1: The Identity Shift: From Doing the Work to Enabling It
Move from maker to multiplier, and handle the delicate shift of managing former peers and friends, with a script for the first conversation.
Chapter 2: Your First Three Months: Listen, Learn, Then Win Small
A three-phase plan for your first three months: listen and learn, shape and test, deliver and embed.
Chapter 3: One-to-Ones That People Actually Want
Rhythm, a four-part agenda, better questions and how to handle emotional moments without overpromising confidentiality.
Chapter 4: Goals, Expectations and Working Agreements
SMART and OKR basics, the Five-Point Brief for any task, and how to build a written team working agreement.
Chapter 5: Delegation Without Dumping or Hovering
What to delegate and what to keep, the five-level delegation ladder and how to resist taking work back.
Chapter 6: Feedback and Recognition That Land
The original NOTE feedback model for both praise and correction, recognition that matches the person, and feedback across cultures.
Chapter 7: When Performance Slips
Diagnose the cause, hold the early conversation, document factually and know when to involve HR. Practical guidance, not legal advice.
Chapter 8: Team Culture and Psychological Safety
Amy Edmondson's concept of psychological safety in plain words, and five everyday behaviours that make it safe to speak up.
Chapter 9: Running Meetings and Making Decisions
Meetings with one clear purpose, written decision rights, four ways to decide and how to disagree and then commit.
Chapter 10: Leading Hybrid and Remote Teams Across Time Zones
Avoid managing by proximity, default to written communication, rotate inconvenient meeting times and share opportunities fairly.
Chapter 11: AI as Your Co-Pilot, Not Your Stand-In
Where AI genuinely helps a manager, what it must never do, and a traffic-light rule for what data can go into it.
Chapter 12: Managing Up, Across and Yourself
A weekly update that solves most managing-up problems, stakeholder relationships, and habits for your own energy and resilience.
Conclusion: The Manager Your Team Will Remember
Why small habits repeated weekly matter more than any big moment.
Appendix A: Your 90-Day Plan Template
A week-by-week template and a five-minute Friday check.
Appendix B: The 1:1 Question Bank
55 questions across seven themes, from getting to know someone to career growth and feedback for you.
Appendix C: Feedback and Difficult-Conversation Scripts
Fill-in-the-blank scripts for praise, correction, missed deadlines, quality issues, undermining and delivering news you didn't decide.
Appendix D: Delegation Planner
A one-page planner and checklist for handing over work at the right level.
Not just reading. Tools you will actually use.
Templates and planners
- 90-day plan template with a weekly Friday check
- Delegation planner and pre-handover checklist
- Decision-rights table for common team decisions
- Shared 1:1 document structure
Scripts and question banks
- 55 one-to-one questions across seven themes
- Word-for-word scripts for feedback, performance and managing former peers
- Follow-up email templates for performance conversations
- Scripts for raising credit and overruling issues with your own manager
Frameworks you can use tomorrow
- The NOTE feedback model
- The five-level delegation ladder
- The Five-Point Brief for any task
- The three-phase 90-day plan and the performance path
AI prompts and guardrails
- Copy-ready prompts for 1:1 prep, task briefs, decision records and review structure
- A role-play prompt to rehearse difficult conversations
- The traffic-light rule for what never goes into an AI tool
- Tool-agnostic: works with ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude, Copilot or your company's approved assistant
When you finish, you will be able to…
Every outcome is practised in the book through worked examples and a short exercise.
- You will be able to plan your first 90 days week by week and explain the plan to your manager.
- You will be able to run regular 1:1s that surface problems early and build trust.
- You will be able to give clear, specific feedback and recognition using the NOTE model.
- You will be able to delegate at the right level and stop redoing your team's work.
- You will be able to hold an early performance conversation, document it and know when to involve HR.
- You will be able to lead a hybrid or cross-time-zone team fairly.
- You will be able to use AI for preparation and admin while keeping personal and performance data out of it.
- You will be able to manage up with a short weekly update and protect your own energy.
A taste of Chapter 1
Here is the shift in one sentence. As an individual contributor, you were measured on what you produced. As a manager, you are measured on what your team produces, and on whether they can keep producing it without you in the room. Your value used to come from your own output. Now it comes from clarity (do people know what good looks like?), capability (can they do it?), confidence (do they believe they can?) and conditions (have you removed the blockers?). Your hands-on work becomes a smaller part of the picture, chosen deliberately rather than grabbed because it is comfortable. We call this the move from maker to multiplier. A maker adds value by doing; a multiplier makes several other people more effective. A brilliant maker who slows six people down by hovering loses. An average maker who helps six people each get a little better wins comfortably.
The honest comparison
| Typical advice | This book | |
|---|---|---|
| Structure | General leadership principles with no timeline | A three-phase, week-by-week 90-day plan with a printable template |
| Feedback | "Be honest but kind" and the feedback sandwich | The NOTE model plus word-for-word scripts for praise and correction |
| Managing former peers | Rarely covered, or a single paragraph | A four-step approach and a script for the first conversation |
| AI at work | Either ignored or presented as a shortcut for everything | Practical prompts for prep and admin, with clear rules on what never goes in |
| Global teams | Written for one country and one office | Examples from India, Nigeria, the Philippines, the UK, the US, Kenya, the Gulf and more, plus a chapter on time zones |
Made for you if…
- Newly promoted team leads and first-time managers in any industry
- Technical experts (engineers, analysts, accountants, scientists) who were promoted for being great at the work
- Anyone now managing former peers or friends
- Managers leading hybrid, remote or cross-time-zone teams
- Experienced individual contributors preparing for their first management role
- HR and L&D teams looking for a practical book for first-time manager cohorts
Probably not for you if…
- Senior leaders looking for strategy, organisation design or executive leadership theory
- Readers who want legal advice on employment law (the book is practical and points you to HR and local law)
- Anyone hoping AI can do the people side of management for them
Written by trainers, tested in real rooms.
Bodhih Training has designed and delivered corporate programmes since 2008 for leadership teams, new managers, sales and service teams, and whole organisations. The Bodhih Professional Playbooks distil what works in those workshops into books you can use on a Tuesday morning, without a facilitator in the room.
Reading in two minutes from now
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- STEP 3
Start with Chapter 1
Read on your phone tonight, or on your commute tomorrow. Do the first "Do this today" exercise and notice the difference.
Start your first 90 days with a plan
You already have the expertise that got you promoted; this book gives you the habits that make people want to work for you. Download it now and book your first 1:1s this week, whether you read it cover to cover tonight or one chapter at a time on your commute.
Personal licence: for the buyer's own use on their own devices. Please don't share or resell the file. Team and company licences: solutions@bodhih.com.
Keep growing with the Bodhih family
Applied AI for First-time Managers
A certification pathway for new managers: SCORM courses, practice and an assessed capstone.
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Practical, safe ways new managers use AI for prep and admin.
First-time manager programme
Run a cohort programme for your new managers with Bodhih Training.
Bodhih.org
Certification pathways in Applied AI, Workplace English and management.
AssessAll
Measure your skills with AI-graded assessments and verified credentials.
Jobulary
Turn what you learn into an individual development plan that stays yours.
Pewple
Book a vetted coach for career, leadership or communication. Pay per session.
Bodhih Training
Run this book as a workshop for your team, in person or live online.
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What should a new manager do in the first week?
Meet your team as a group, then book a getting-to-know-you 1:1 with every direct report over the next ten working days. Agree with your own manager what success looks like at 90 days. Resist announcing big changes until you understand how things got the way they are.
How do I manage people who used to be my peers?
Name the change early in a private conversation, ask each person what they need from you, and be explicit about how you will make fair decisions. Keep the warmth, but stop sharing gossip or discussing other people's performance. Chapter 1 includes a script for that first conversation.
What questions should I ask in a one-on-one meeting?
Start with open questions such as "What's on your mind this week?" and "What's taking more energy than it should?", then pause and listen. Rotate in questions about growth, workload and feedback for you. Appendix B has 55 questions grouped into seven themes.
How do I give feedback as a new manager without damaging the relationship?
Be specific, timely and private, and focus on behaviour rather than personality. The book's NOTE model helps: Name the moment, Outline the effect, Turn it over for their view, and End with an agreement. Give specific praise far more often than correction.
How should I handle an underperforming employee?
Act early, and first find out why: unclear expectations, a skill gap, workload, motivation, personal circumstances or conduct. Hold a private conversation with specific examples, agree the expectation and your support, set a follow-up date and document it. Involve HR before any formal step and follow your company's policy and local law.
Can I use AI tools like ChatGPT as a manager?
Yes, for preparation and admin such as drafting agendas, structuring a review template or rehearsing a difficult conversation with a made-up scenario. Never paste personal data, performance details, health or pay information into a tool your company has not approved for it, and never let AI decide or deliver feedback for you.
Is this book useful for managers of remote or hybrid teams?
Yes. Chapter 10 covers leading across time zones, defaulting to written communication, running fair hybrid meetings and avoiding the trap of giving the best work to whoever sits closest to you. Examples throughout come from distributed teams in many countries.
Can my company buy this for a cohort of new managers?
Yes. The standard purchase is a personal licence, and team or company licences are available by emailing solutions@bodhih.com. Bodhih Training (bodhih.com) also runs first-time manager programmes for companies, and the book works well as pre-reading or a follow-up resource.
Is there a certification for first-time managers that builds on this book?
Bodhih's Applied AI for First-time Managers certification pathway on bodhih.org (bodhih.org/pathways/applied-ai-first-time-managers) goes deeper into the same skills with structured practice. If you want ongoing support, Bodhih's ecosystem also includes Jobulary individual development plans, Pewple leadership coaches and AssessAll leadership assessments.
Can I get a refund on the eBook?
eBooks are non-refundable once downloaded. We will help if the file is corrupted and we cannot fix it within 3 working days, if you were charged twice, or if delivery failed.
How much does New Manager, Week One cost?
₹399 including 18% GST for buyers in India, or $9.99 for buyers outside India. One-time payment, no subscription, with an automatic invoice.
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