Presidents do it, Prime Ministers do it, even the guy who takes over the local pub does it: the new broom always speaks clean. The message is that things are going to be different, from now on.
Picture credit: infrogmation
That’s why incoming managers are usually incredibly quick to make a series of sweeping statements and unsubstantiated promises for a brighter future.
Of course it’s only natural for people, when they get new jobs, to want to make an immediate impact, to stamp their own indelible mark on the territory.
But the real mark of a manager, at every level of society, is made by what they actually do and achieve, rather than what they promise. Fine words are never enough, delivery is the key performance indicator for a manager.
We would do well to remember therefore that inaugural commitments are often poorly considered; because the new manager may not yet understand their new context properly, or may be simply carried away by the excitement of their new position.
True insight and understanding are rarely available from the get go.
Wielding a new broom is always a challenging opportunity so, if you want to reduce the risk of making managerial statements that will become hostages to fortune, I recommend that you look at the process of developing understanding, described so well by Rob Eastaway in his piece about Jardin’s principle which explains how our awareness of a situation moves progressively through three phases: simplistic, complicated, simple.
We also need to think about why we are given the broom: to make an effective difference through the skilful and timely application of the resources at our disposal. 
The annals of every organisation are littered with the broken bones of well-intentioned commitments made by new managers.
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