Leadership

From Blogs to Books, Here Are the Best Resources for New Managers

While a promotion to manager is exciting, it’s also intimidating. A new title comes with more responsibilities and significant expectations. Your actions and leadership influence more than just the bottom line. It influences your company's most valuable asset—its employees.

This pressure can overwhelm first-time managers, and knowing where to turn for advice can prove cumbersome. Fortunately, resources for new managers are more plentiful than you might think. If you want to become a better manager right from the start, use these blogs, tools, podcasts, and books to propel you to success in your new management role.


Resources for New Managers: The Top 5 Blogs To Subscribe To

Manager reading a blog

Sometimes you don't have time to scour the internet, library, or bookstore for the best advice on being a great manager. As such, subscribing to or following great blogs is a great way to save time on finding information.


When you follow a high-quality blog, you know you're getting up-to-date information in a concise and easy-to-consume format. Here are the top five blogs to check out to help boost your management skills.


1. Seth’s Blog

Best-selling author, entrepreneur, and leader of change Seth Godin gives you personal insights into the world of leadership in his blog. A renowned speaker and writer who motivates thousands of people around the world, Seth’s blog features inspiring reflections on leadership, management, and marketing.


His blog also helps with problem-solving, critical thinking, and soft skills that teach you how to cut away the fat of a problem until only the solution is left.‍ If you're especially concerned about a crowded mind getting in the way of effective management, this is one of the best resources for new managers.


2. Lattice

Lattice is a great resource for new managers and one of the best places to stay up-to-date on the best practices in the HR world.‍ This site hosts numerous helpful articles geared toward new manager training, which may alleviate the concerns you have going into the position.


If you want to stay on track, sign up for their newsletter for a weekly dose of insightful management strategy.


3. Harvard Business Review

Harvard Business Review—also known by the acronym HBR—is one of the most reputable and best resources for all managers—new and veteran. Sponsored directly by Harvard University, this blog shares daily posts from several contributors with years of management experience at Fortune 500 companies.



It discusses many topics, including leadership, negotiation, strategy, operations, marketing, and finance on top of management, and even niche topics related to specific businesses.



You can either sign up for various subscription levels to view HBR articles or view them for free with a limit of three per month.


4. James Clear

Effective leadership comes from being able to manage your team and yourself effectively.‍ And that’s just what makes James Clear an excellent read.

As a great resource for new managers, Clear’s blog unpacks the science and psychology behind habits step-by-step, thus creating a positive routine and how to rid yourself of poor habits that can hinder your leadership style and management progress.


Topics include a discussion of productivity, decision-making, performance, employee engagement, and motivation.


5. Unicorn Labs

You wouldn't be taking our advice if you didn't think we had anything good to say, right? The ultimate goal of Unicorn Labs’ must-read blog is to develop managers into Unicorn Leaders.


We post weekly articles focusing on various management topics, with a specific focus on how to help you build an all-star team, develop new skills, and become a great boss and good manager in the process with easy-to-apply management tips.


The Top 5 Tools To Make Your Life Easier

Woman using online tools on a tablet while smiling

Technology makes our lives easier and is one of the newfound resources for new managers. By having valuable technological tools behind you, the transition to your new management position becomes second-nature. Whether you're a technophile or you struggle with new tech, these easy-to-use manager resource tools can help you excel in your new position.


1. A DISC Assessment

Emotional Intelligence is an essential skill of any manager, and it starts with knowing yourself.‍ If you want to manage other people effectively, you need to understand your strengths and weaknesses and how you interact with people.‍


The DISC Assessment is a tried-and-true personality test that creates a categorized understanding of individuals' typical patterns of behaviors and emotions. Through this test, you can understand what your strengths and weaknesses are, providing a roadmap to the management style that works best for you and your team.


2. Todoist

The classic stereotype of managers holding a never-ending to-do list couldn't be more accurate. As a new manager, a larger to-do list may seem intimidating, but tools like Todoist can help you handle it.‍


Todoist is a to-do list app used by millions of people worldwide. It allows you to keep track of everything in one place and easily prioritize your various tasks. If you're looking to improve your organizational skills and improve your productivity, this app is a necessity.


3. Miro

Miro is a meeting, workshop, and collaboration tool. Think of it as an online whiteboard. This tool makes it easy to flesh out ideas and brainstorm with your onsite or remote team in your new role as manager.


Everyone on the team can easily create various sticky notes, and webs and add pictures and comments all at once. This tool is highly recommended for teams who work on creative projects. and is one of the best resources for new managers.

4. Pocket

As a new manager, you're going to have a lot of reading material to get through each day. That’s what makes Pocket an excellent tool for managers. It allows you to save articles, videos, and stories to create your content library. With your content library in tow, you have everything you need at your fingertips at a moment’s notice.


5. Calendly

Management comes with meetings of all varieties. From client meetings to one-on-one meetings with employees, going back and forth through email to schedule them is not efficient.


That’s why you’re going to need Calendly. This tool allows you to easily schedule all of your meetings quickly and easily, while also allowing other participants to schedule the event on their own calendar.

Top 5 Podcasts To Listen To

Headphones around a phone listening to a podcast

Although the morning commute from your bed to your office is much shorter than what you're used to, I'm sure you still have time to fit in a morning podcast while you eat breakfast. Check out these five podcasts to help you think about how to improve your leadership and management skills.


1. Masters of Scale

This business and finance podcast is hosted by the co-founder of LinkedIn, Reid Hoffman.‍ Each week Hoffman interviews a different business leader and chats about the ideas and actions that makes their company successful.


The guest list on Masters of Scale features a wide variety of business owners and celebrities, including everyone from Bill Gates to Gwyneth Paltrow.


2. The Gallup Podcast

The Gallup Podcast is hosted by Gallup's editor-in-chief, Mohamed Younis. In his episodes, he discusses what society thinks about the most pressing issues in the workplace—an invaluable resource for new managers. He also demonstrates how leaders and managers can use their unique perspectives to make informed decisions—adding a helpful set of ideas for the new-manager toolkit.

3. Beyond the To-Do List

If you're overwhelmed by your exponentially growing to-do list as a new manager, Beyond the To-Do List host Erik Fisher can sort you out. He talks with real people who implement useful and practical productivity strategies to balance their professional and personal lives.


This podcast explores all productivity factors, including getting work done right the first time and completing tasks that accelerate goal achievement.


4. Supermanagers

Supermanagers is a podcast hosted by the team at Fellow.app., which hosts insightful episodes that span various topics of management for people of all experience levels.


More specifically, the podcast aims o improve the leadership skills of managers and positively impact their teams and organizations. Here you will find some thoughtful episodes that give you first-hand insight into the world of management.


5. Leadership and Loyalty

Are you trying to get yourself into the same mindset as Fortune 500 executives? Start listening to this podcast. Leadership is constantly changing and what constitutes good leadership today is different than ten years ago.


In Leadership and Loyalty, host Dov Baron talks with world-class guests such as Guy Kawasaki, Jordan Harbinger, and John Oates to share the truth about the journeys of devastation to purpose.


The Top 5 Books To Read

New manager reading a book

If you're a bookworm—or even if you aren’t—you have to check out these top five management books. Each one provides a distinctive and one-of-a-kind perspective on improving your leadership and the interactions you have with your team members.


1. “Good to Great” by Jim Collins

In “Good to Great,” how companies rarely transition from good to great and how most fail. In the book, Collins defines greatness and describes seven characteristics of companies that successfully make the transition.


2. “The 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership” by John Maxwell

John Maxwell is one of the world’s top authorities on leadership. In his book, Maxwell breaks down the concept of leadership into bite-size, digestable pieces. Each of the 21 laws he lists has its own chapter sharing personal stories and connections to historically great leaders.

This quick yet inspiring read is a great way to get you started on your journey toward better leadership and a top resource for new managers, regardless of your personality or experience in an industry.


3. “The 5 Dysfunctions of a Team” by Patrick Lencioni

Lencioni offers his keen intellect and insight through his fascinating retelling of Kathryn Petersen's story. Petersen, Decision Tech's CEO, faces the critical leadership crisis of uniting a dysfunctional team that could destroy an entire company.

Throughout the story, Lencioni reveals five dysfunctions that even the best teams struggle through and outlines actionable models to help managers to improve team cohesion. This book will serve you for years to come as you continue to move forward in your management career.

4. “Creativity, INC.” by Ed Catmull

If there was ever a manual that would be the bible for creativity and innovation in management, this is the one. “Creativity INC.” gives you an all-access trip into the heart of Pixar Animation, learning the company’s processes along the way, including meetings, postmortems, and “braintrust” sessions.


Catmull walks you through building a creative culture and shows you what to do on your team to protect the creative process and reach new heights of innovation.


5. “Culture Code” by Daniel Coyle

As a manager, you must create the ideal environment for your team to perform to the best of their ability, starting with corporate culture. In “Culture Code,” Coyle goes inside the world's most successful organization in this book and describes what makes them tick.


He details the skills needed to generate team cohesion and cooperation, drawing on examples from various successful companies. By reading this book, you can learn strategies to help you build trust, learning, and positive change within your team.


The Final Chapter of Resources for New Managers

Even the best resources can point you in the right direction as a manager, but the ability to put these practices into play isn’t always easy. If you’re serious about a career as a successful manager, leadership training just might be the best resource for a new manager.


With the in-person guidance of someone who has been there before, you can learn introspective processes, leadership practices, and other tips to turn you from a manager into a leader. It’s just one more step you can take that will put you in the pantheon of legendary managers.

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