If there’s one common refrain that unites manager-level employees across the workforce, it may very well be, “Who has the time?”

As employees rise through the ranks to take on managerial roles and see their daily responsibilities expand, getting through the day can often become a case of treading water, spending hours responding to urgent matters that arise with very little warning and making sure team members complete their own tasks. This, naturally, can feel detrimental to you as a manager – particularly when it comes to advancing your work as a leader and the company’s long-term, big picture goals. But, it doesn’t have to be that way.

Linda A. Hill, a professor at Harvard Business School, and Kent Lineback, author of Collective Genius: The Art and Practice of Leading Innovation, have outlined for the Harvard Business Review three key objectives that every manager should work toward every day. Despite the fact that these Three Imperatives of Leading and Managing, as they’ve been named, may appear to only add to managers’ workloads, Hill and Lineback make the argument that they are actually helpful in achieving managerial goals.

“The daily work isn’t an impediment to doing what good leaders do,” they write. “Instead, it’s the way, the vehicle, to do most of what good managers do.”

Build Trust. “Successful leadership is, at root, about influencing others,” the authors explain. “You cannot influence anyone who does not trust you.” They argue that building trust can be broken down by focusing on and demonstrating two key characteristics: competence and character. Managers can do this “by taking the opportunity to demonstrate their ability as they do their daily work, by asking knowledgeable questions and offering insightful suggestions. They use daily decisions and choices to illustrate their own values, expressing their concern for those who work for them or those for whom the group does its work.” In the end, the more your team trusts you, the more likely the are to work to your standards, on both smaller, routine tasks and large-scale concerns.

Build a real team and manage through it. “In a genuine team, the bonds among members are so strong that they truly believe they will all succeed or fail together and that no individual can win if the team loses,” Hill and Lineback state. That bond is strengthened by a common purpose and shared values. Furthermore, real teams also have “rules of engagement,” or an understanding of how the team functions. Together, the purpose, values and rules allow a manager to leverage the success of the team to improve individual performance. Good managers utilize daily challenges as a way to reinforce those ideals.

Lastly, build a network. Hill and Linebeck emphasize networking as an important leadership tool. “Effective group leaders proactively build and maintain a network of these [outside people and groups], which include not just those needed for today’s work but also those the group will need to achieve future goals.” They cite networking as particularly difficult for newly appointed managers, many of whom are adverse to the glad-handing and faux-friendly nature of it. But, as the co-authors point out, “building a network can be politicking, but it need not be if they do it honestly, openly, and with the genuine intent of creating relationships that benefit both sides.” Additionally, “by taking opportunities afforded by routine activities – a regular meeting of department heads, for example, or even a chance meeting in the elevator,” managers demonstrate leadership qualities to their team that can ultimately prove beneficial to the group as a whole.

For more tips and ideas from Hill and Linebeck, read their HBR article in full here.