The middle phase is about staying the course, being resilient, navigating obstacles and pushing through. The middle phase of anything is often when the really hard work occurs. After 30 days, the novelty of your arrival is passing, but you have not yet been there long enough to be in a position to show any results. As such, you are well and truly stuck in the middle.

Everyone has expectations of you within 100 days, but your first month can fly by without anyone expecting you to do much at all. At the same time, judgment day is looming. You are a third of the way through your first 100 days, so you need to take stock and check that you are making progress and that you are on track to achieve your first 100 days’ desired outcomes.

In the middle phase of your first 100 days’ journey, you need to work harder, and move beyond yourself and get others working for you. The middle is often associated with a time that you feel you may have bitten off more than you can chew. But know that if you keep persevering, then glory awaits you. In the first 30 days you will be forgiven for spending most of your time meeting your boss, stakeholders and team and getting up to speed. But in this middle phase, that early forgiveness starts to give way to an increasing desire from your role stakeholders to see real action occurring and early results secured.

In the forthcoming chapters, I outline an approach and key steps for what you can do to tackle the core middle phase.