(Photo Courtesy of <a href=http://www.flickr.com/photos/timpatterson/476098132/>Tim Patterson via Flickr</a>.)

Promotions are great: you get a better title, more seniority, maybe even a raise.

But now you also have to supervise your former colleagues and maybe even people who have been your work friends.

“The probability that -- at some point, if you get promoted in your career -- you’ve got peers below you is about 90 percent,” says Brandon Smith, a workplace consultant and career coach and our go-to expert on working issues. “It’s a whole different dynamic.”

Smith says it will be impossible to avoid stepping on some toes as you make the transition from colleague to supervisor. But he says talking with your new subordinates and setting expectations up front will help.

He explains in this week’s Working on GPB Radio.

Click here ask Brandon a question about your job or career. We might answer you on the air.