You will be able to write down your team's unwritten rules, so nobody is judged against a standard they never heard.
Most teams run on rules nobody has written down. They cover how fast to reply to a client, how good a draft must be before it goes to the manager, when to escalate a problem, how to flag that a deadline will slip, and whether cameras go on in video meetings. These are the team's expectations, meaning how the work is done day to day. Goals are different: they say what results you want, and Lesson 4.1, "From team purpose to individual goals", covers them. Expectations are the unwritten rules for how people get to those results.
Every team has these rules. In most teams they live only in the manager's head and in the habits of the longest-serving people, so new joiners learn them by breaking them. Someone failing a standard nobody stated is one of the most common and least fair problems on a new manager's team.
New managers are especially likely to assume their own habits are everyone's. You were good at the job, so your way of doing it feels like the obvious way. That might mean replying within the hour, double-checking every number or calling a client before emailing. Others often don't share these habits, and usually there was no reason for them to guess. The result is a manager who is quietly frustrated by things people don't know they are doing wrong. Over time that frustration shows in tone and in reviews, and people feel judged against a test they never saw.
Take Wei Ling, a manager (the people and figures here are invented examples). She answers client emails within the hour. She always has, and it is how she built her reputation. She assumed everyone on her team did the same. Then a client complained that a question to Farid had gone unanswered for a day and a half.
When she raised it with him, Farid was genuinely surprised. He writes reports and checks email twice a day so he can concentrate on them. No one had ever told him this wasn't fine. He picked up the habit from his previous manager, who wanted long blocks of focused time, and in that team it was the right call. Nobody had told him this team worked differently, so the standard he missed was one nobody had stated.
The fix is to write the expectations down, and how you write them matters a great deal. Many teams write them as traits: "Be proactive", "Take ownership", "Communicate well". These sound right and almost nobody disagrees with them. Because of that, everyone thinks they already meet them, and nobody can check.
Write each one as a behaviour someone could observe instead. Here are three traits rewritten as behaviours:
"Be responsive" becomes: reply to client emails within four working hours, even if only to say when you'll have an answer. "Take ownership" becomes: if you can see a deadline will slip, tell the person waiting before it slips, and give a new date. "Quality matters" becomes: check figures against the source before a report goes to a client.
You can check a behaviour, teach it to a new joiner, and discuss it fairly when it isn't met. Communicate at work, lesson 7.1, "Describe the behaviour, not the person", makes the same point about feedback, and it applies to expectations too.
If your team is hybrid, include the expectations hybrid work creates. These are which days people are in the office, how quickly to answer team chat, when cameras are on, and how to show you are away from your desk. Communicate at work, lesson 8.4, "Set team norms for remote and hybrid work", covers these in more depth.
Agree expectations with the team. Don't announce them. If you write the list and send it round, people will read it and most will follow it for a while. But announced rules feel imposed, and they tend to fade once people stop worrying about them.
Instead, bring a draft to the team as a starting point. Ask what they would change, what's missing and what's unrealistic. The team will often improve the expectations. Wei Ling's draft said client emails should get a reply within four working hours. Farid pointed out that this was impossible on report days, so the team agreed a Monday exception with an auto-reply.
The conversation also brings out expectations people already have of each other and of you. Someone may want to hear about changes before they are announced to the whole office, or may want a rule about after-hours messages. These belong on the list too. Hui Min added one Wei Ling had never thought of: when you take over someone's client during leave, read the last two weeks of the thread before replying.
Start by noticing the unwritten rules on your team, including your own habits that you assume others share. From those, pick the five expectations causing the most friction today. Write each one as a behaviour and keep the list short enough to remember.
Draft your five now, in the behaviour form, so they are ready to bring to the team.
Draft five working expectations for your team as behaviours someone could see, and take them to your next team meeting to discuss.
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