Tess Cope has spent 25 years working in leadership development, the last 16 of them independently. She works with senior leaders in medium and large organisations on three things: transforming culture so that people do their best work, helping leadership teams work together effectively, and helping leaders think more clearly about how they are showing up. Her third book — Your First 60 Days — is her most personal and most practical guide yet, built around a framework she has developed across years of one-to-one executive coaching. It is also her second book with Authors & Co. We sat down with her to talk about what really goes wrong for new executives, what the right first 60 days look like, and why she believes the sequence most leaders follow is the wrong one.
The statistics are stark: up to 50 percent of new executives fail to meet expectations in their first 18 months. What is actually going wrong in those first months, and is it what most people would assume?
There is some general research out there, and I have also done my own research specifically leading into this book. What it shows reinforces my lived experience: between 30 and 50 percent of new executives are falling short of the expectation of the brief they believe they have been set – and I say it that way deliberately, because the brief they think they have is often very different from the reality they meet when they arrive.
There are three big derailers. The first is that they do not re-contract on expectations – they do not manage their number one stakeholder around what success actually looks like given the reality of the organisation. The gap between what the company thinks it needs and the work that actually needs doing is often much larger than anyone realised during the interview process.
The second and third are linked. We come in with what I call a prove-me mindset – a real sense of obligation to demonstrate that the business made the right decision in hiring us. We arrive with all our experience and our kit bag and we try to insert it, sometimes quite abruptly, into an organisation that was not asking for it in that form. And then, when things start to go wobbly, we are often unwilling or uncomfortable about asking for help. I include myself in that. I know I have fallen into both traps.
You talk about a systemic approach to onboarding, and contrast it with how senior leaders typically think about entering a new role. What is the difference, and why does it matter so much?
Because of the prove-me mindset, we feel obliged to arrive with a plan as quickly as possible. From a systemic point of view, that puts you at real risk of being rejected by the organisation – because you are not coming in with curiosity. You are not coming in with genuine respect for everything that has come before you.
The systemic approach invites you to suspend your judgment, leave the critique off the agenda, and truly listen with respect to everything that the people and the organisation as a whole have endured and experienced. It causes you to slow down.
I use a 3H framework in the book: Honor the history, understand what is Here now, and create Hope for the future. Everyone wants to rush through what is working and what is not and get to the plan quickly. The systemic approach says: go much deeper first, with respect, and honour everything that has been. When you do that, people feel seen. And when people feel seen, they become ready to have an honest conversation about what is here and what is not. You create the conditions for Hope rather than demanding it.
You describe something called organ rejection – the idea that organisations can reject a new senior leader. That is a powerful phrase. What does it actually look like, and what causes it?
The parallel is direct. A new leader, like a new organ, has to figure out what the conditions are in which they need to thrive. And the body was already thriving before they arrived. So the question is: how do you insert yourself with precision and care, and allow yourself to be embedded and integrated?
It is incredibly naive – and I say that because I know I have done it – to think you are the answer to all of the organisation’s questions. You are arriving as an organ into an existing body. Your job is to figure out how to allow the body to accept you and bring the whole body into its next chapter.
What organ rejection actually looks like in practice is what I call nodding dog syndrome. Everyone is saying yes, absolutely, completely makes sense, why didn’t we do that before – and behind the scenes, in the coffee conversations, the real conversation is: we’ll give them six months. People start to disengage. They say the right things and stop following through. The system starts to fester, and before long you have people moving away rather than moving with you.
What is the single biggest mistake new executives make in their first 60 days? And what is the quickest way to course-correct if they are already down that path?
The biggest mistake is bringing the plan together too quickly. Underpinned by the prove-me mindset, the instinct is to have everything on the table within the first four weeks. That is the mistake, and everything flows from it.
My biggest recommendation – which is at the heart of the book – is to flip the script. The place you need to go first is inward, not outward. Even before you start, go inwards and ask: what does this system need from me? Not what do I want to give it, not what changes do I want to make, but how do I need to calibrate myself in order to help lift this system into its next chapter?
Then, from that inward starting point, you move out. First to the human – who am I in this role? Then to the relational – who are my key stakeholders, including the ones who are not obvious? The person on reception who has been in the business for 25 years almost certainly has stories you need to hear. And then to the systemic – let me understand everything I have inherited. Only then do you bring the strategic plan. Changing the sequence changes everything.
How should a new executive think about integration into what you call the inner sanctum of leadership?
The inner sanctum is twofold. The first part is the going inwards – asking how you need to calibrate yourself to be the right person for what this system needs, not what you need it to be. When you do that with genuine respect, you are invited in. You are not pushing. You are not forcing yourself on a system that has not welcomed you.
The second part is asking: who are all the people who have made this organisation as brilliant as it is today? Respecting and honouring the people who built what you have inherited. Those two things together – the inward calibration and the genuine honouring of what has come before – create the invitation. Without them, you are trying to push your way into an inner sanctum that is not ready for you.
Building industry reputation sounds like something that should come later, but you position it as something that begins in those first 60 days. Why is that timing so important?
The dangerous thing, particularly in an established organisation, is to make it all about you. Your individual reputation. When you have mapped the history, understood where the business has been brilliant, what it has learned, what the successes and the failures and the insights from those have been, you are already starting to build the reputation of the culture of the business by giving it space. You have the collateral, within those 60 days, to tell the story of where it has been and where you are beginning to think about where it is going – because you have brought people with you in that process.
A very simple way of saying it: it is not an I, it is a we. It is not my reputation, it is our reputation. And by default, you will get what you need in terms of credibility as a leader from that approach.
Who really needs this book? Is it the executive who is already struggling, or is it preventative?
The person I wrote it for is real. Her name is Stephanie. She has been appointed into a significant leadership role with a great deal of experience behind her, but the system she is joining is very unique and very different. She has been appointed but not yet started, and she is having to reconfigure how she is going to enter the organisation. That is when the book is at its most valuable.
That said, it is also a practical tool for anyone in the pipeline – for building the muscle before you even get the appointment, so that when you enter you go into exploration mindset rather than prove-me mindset. And for the leader who is already in post and already having challenges: the combination of the book, the companion app, and coaching can absolutely pull someone back from the verge. We have seen it happen.
This is your second book with Authors & Co. What has changed since your first?
The single biggest difference this time was being super clear on who I was writing for from the very beginning. In book two I got to a really sticky point halfway through and realised I had changed who I was writing for without noticing it. That is why it felt so hard. This time, Stephanie was present throughout the whole process. I captured my promise at the front of the manuscript and kept coming back to it. Would this work for Stephanie? Is this the right language for Stephanie?
Working closely with Deanne (Authors & Co Editor) has also been central to this. She has a way of giving feedback that keeps you buoyant even when the feedback is tough. Writing a book while continuing with full client work is genuinely hard, and having that editorial support alongside you makes an enormous difference.
I also kept something by my desk the whole way through – a book with a plain cover that said: book number three, on sale, third of September. It was in my eyeline every time I sat down to write. It kept me in momentum. And now that I have the finished book in my hand, I know it was worth every bit of the effort.
For anyone considering writing a book and wondering whether to work with a publisher or go it alone, what would you say to them?
I would not even consider putting something out on my own. I would absolutely not advocate that, because I think you can underestimate the expertise you need alongside you – not just through the writing process but through everything that comes after it, including how you think about distribution and getting the book into the world properly.
What I have found with Authors & Co is genuinely a 360 offer. It is not just the editorial support, It is the full picture – the thinking about what the book needs to do, who it is for, and how it lands in the world. I have moved people in the direction of Authors & Co before and I always will, because when you experience the level of expertise and care that is in that team, you realise very quickly that this is not something you want to do without.
Authors & Co is a UK hybrid publisher for nonfiction books. Founded by Abigail Horne in 2017, we help founders, leaders, and experts write and publish books that work strategically. Over 700 authors, 50+ countries.
