More than 50% of executives who inherit a mess fail within their first 18 months on the job. To effectively lead a turnaround, resist the temptation to emotionally distance yourself and blame your predecessor. Moreover, minimize references to your past successes; while you should draw on what’s worked for you in the past, no one in a struggling organization likes to hear “This is how we did it at my old company.” You are part of this team now; embrace it. Doing so will help you manage the emotions of people who are probably worrying about keeping their jobs. To help keep their anxiety down, be transparent about how you’ll make changes to the organization and on what kind of timeline. But don’t be afraid to push back when they bring you data that seems skewed, or offer ideas that seem designed to showcase how valuable they are. You want to clean up the mess, not create another one.

https://hbr.org/leading-effectively-when-you-inherit-a-mess