Adam Bryant conducts interviews of senior-level executives that appear in his “Corner Office” column each week in the SundayBusiness section of The New York Times. Here are a few insights provided during an interview of Cindi Leive, editor in chief of Glamour magazine. To read the complete interview, check out other articles, and obtain subscription information, please click here.

Photo credit: Dimitrios Kambouris of Getty Images for Glamour

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Were you in leadership roles as a kid?

I loved reading and writing, and I had what I guess you would describe as a “magazine brain” from Day 1. When I was 8, I decided to publish a literary magazine, and I would solicit contributions from all the kids on my street. They were a little less interested in the project than I was, so I ended up having to fill most of the magazine myself.

Tell me about your parents.

I was lucky to have two great mother figures in my life. My mom was a biochemist — she was one of just a few women in leadership roles at the National Institutes of Health — and really loved her work. She would come home and be talking about lipopolysaccharides and cell membranes at the dinner table. What I took away from that was that it’s an amazing gift to have a job that you love.

I also have an incredible stepmother who gave up her career to move to the United States to marry my dad, and I saw in her a woman who was completely happy and fulfilled in her life and not working full time outside the home. That made me more open-minded about all the different choices you can make in your life. So the whole “mommy wars” thing really sets my teeth on edge.

Were there any expressions they would repeat often around the dinner table?

I remember my dad telling me, “If you’re not early, you’re late.” That definitely stuck with me.

When did you first start managing people?

I was about 25. Nobody ever really sits you down and says, “Here’s some Management 101 on how to do it.” It’s a skill you have to learn. Just because you know how to be a good friend, and even a good co-worker, doesn’t mean that you’re going to know how to be a good boss. I didn’t ask as many questions in the beginning as I should have.

Any specific memo-to-self moments?

The big challenge for me was learning how to be firm and clear. It’s very reassuring for employees to understand what is expected of them. Otherwise, how will they know that they’re doing a good job? Finding a way to do that while also creating an office that is warm and friendly and engaging is a balancing act that it took me a while to master.

Really getting to know your team and being interested in their lives also gives you good will. So when you’re in a situation where you need to deliver a message that maybe isn’t so easy to hear, it will land on this mattress of good karma. People want to be understood and respected as individuals.

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To read the complete interview as well as Bryant’s interviews of other executives, please click here.

Adam Bryant, deputy national editor of The New York Times, oversees coverage of education issues, military affairs, law, and works with reporters in many of the Times’ domestic bureaus. He also conducts interviews with CEOs and other leaders for Corner Office, a weekly feature in the SundayBusiness section and on nytimes.com that he started in March 2009. In his book, The Corner Office: Indispensable and Unexpected Lessons from CEOs on How to Lead and Succeed, (Times Books), he analyzes the broader lessons that emerge from his interviews with more than 70 leaders. To read an excerpt, please click here. To contact him, please click here.