Ditch the welcome balloons...

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Ahoy,

I’ve just had some great news through that I’d love to share with you!

The platform I use to host this newsletter recently released an analysis of newsletters sent in 2024.

They showed that the average open rate of a leadership based newsletter was 34.99%. Meaning a little over a third of their audience actually opened the emails they were reading!

Well I just want to say thank you.

Because here at Silent leadership we have a 70% open rate - double that of the average newsletter!

This is all testament to your ambition to become the best leaders you can be.

So thank you for reading, for trusting me with your leadership growth, and for making the lives of your team members better.

Now onto our regular schedule, and today we’re talking about introducing the new kid…

Imagine this: you’re the new guy in the team… How is it you want to be treated?

For me, I can summarise it pretty easily.

I’d want to feel welcome.

What does that mean? Well to start with it doesn’t mean a big balloon “WELCOME” sign.

(I can’t believe this actually happens…)

What it actually means is being introduced to the team in a friendly, respectful way, and having people be willing to take time out of their day to help me settle in.

It really isn’t that hard.

I’ve been lucky enough to never feel completely alienated when joining a new team, but I also know that it certainly happens in some places.

Now if you have a new person joining your team, asides from being friendly and helping them settle in, what else can you do to ensure they feel part of the team?

Now this is my main point of the day, and while I’ve framed this as something that will help integrate a new team member, this is vital for all members of your team.

The secret sauce?

Listen to their opinions!

A new member to the team is also a fresh set of eyes.

A new perspective on old problems.

They have new angles to approach problems and can usually see problems you didn’t realise where even there!

So ask for their opinion, and actually listen!

It can be hard hearing feedback from new people…

I mean, after all, what do they know?!

Well it’s the fact that they aren’t biased by your previous experience and knowledge that make their opinions so worth taking seriously.

Now I know I said I framed this towards new joiners, but ultimately this is something that needs to be extended to the whole team.

Just as new perspective can shine light on issues, so can experience. And no I’m not just talking about your experience.

Keep your team motivated and keen to get involved by making sure they know that their opinions matter, and that their voices are heard.

So this week’s word of the week is ‘listen’.

When was the last time you actually received feedback on the way things are running?

And how did you react when you heard that feedback?

Since then, what have you done to encourage more feedback?

I promise, when you listen and take feedback seriously, from old and new team members you’ll be able to solve problems twice as fast, while making sure your team members feel valued and welcome in the process.

Until next week, have a great day.

Reece