Dive Brief:

• Research from Development Dimensions International (DDI) shows that the transition to a leadership position is among life's most challenging, falling somewhere on the list of stressors between personal illness and managing teenagers.
• DDI executives Tacy Byham and Richard Wellins discuss the reality that nobody knows exactly what to do when they start out in their first leadership role in a piece for the Association for Talent Development. 
• Only one in three leaders in the DDI study, Leaders in Transition: Stepping Up, Not Off, felt they were handling things effectively. Conversely, first-time leaders who transition well are more able to make a positive impact on their teams, families, and careers.

Dive Insight:

The authors offer the simple but powerful idea that people must become a "catalyst" to succeed.

Much like an ingredient that induces a chemical reaction, a catalyst leader is someone who ignites action in others. That ignition might jump-start a change in an inefficient process, spawn a new idea for a new product, or—most importantly—effect change in others, they wrote.

The process of being a catalyst mainly involves a set of skills that they call the key principles including maintaining or enhancing self-esteem, listening and responding with empathy, asking for help and encourage involvement, sharing thoughts, feelings, and rationale (to build trust), and finally, providing support without removing responsibility (to build ownership).

In its Lessons for Leaders research, DDI asked workers around the world to discuss their "best boss ever." In their own words, respondents perfectly reflected the catalyst behaviors and key principles presented in the article.