You’re the new CEO of a sinking ship. Here’s how to survive the first 100 days.

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One fine sunny morning, you are given the corner office. You are now the CEO. The chairman of the board takes you aside and says he is relying on you to rescue the company by driving the “innovation agenda.”

The shareholders are holding their breath for you to pull the miracle in a few months, and prove that you are the person for the job. There’s a lot of fanfare. Now you need to deliver.

So, where do you go from here?

Before talking about that, let’s have a look at the history of corporate innovation. Palm CEO Ed Colligan said in 2006 about the iPhone:

“We’ve learned and struggled for a few years here figuring out how to make a decent phone. PC guys are not going to just figure this out. They’re not going to just walk in.”

And then there’s IBM chairman Louis Gertsner, commenting on Amazon:

“Amazon.com is a very interesting retail concept, but wait till you see what Wal-Mart is gearing up to do … IBM is already generating more revenue, and certainly more profit, than all of the top Internet companies combined.”

CB Insights has an interesting read on corporate innovation blunders.

Historically speaking, it’s not a pretty picture. Recently, Jamie Dimon, CEO of JP Morgan, told his Wall Street colleagues that “Silicon Valley is coming to eat our lunch.” Disruption by startups are real and knocking at the door of most large companies. The board has every reason to be worried. Now it’s up to you to prove that they did not make a wrong decision by anointing you.

Now that the context has been established, here’s what you need to do:

1. Don’t talk

I know, I know, it’s very tempting to go to the press and talk about how “innovation” is going to be the center of your strategy and how you’re going to shake up the whole company. Don’t. Innovation is hard, changing culture is harder.

There is a reason so many well-intentioned corporate innovations fail. Bite your tongue. Huddle with your handpicked core team. Draw the blueprint and then come out with a clear, coherent game plan.

2. Pick your core team

If you have already worked in the company, you know who these people are. It should be a mix of folks who understand your core product very well, and gems who have been hidden under a few corporate layers. You want people with the ability to learn and adapt, who are tested across different markets and products.

3. Don’t kill the cash cow

4. Get rid of a few layers

5. Don’t flip-flop

6. Make innovation the culture, not a project

7. Create urgency