Not too long ago I was the safety committee chair for a major corporation and there’s a lot of responsibility that comes with that position. I was in charge of getting 14 people together to come up with ideas, programs, and other opportunities to get the rest of the 150 employees in the company involved in doing things more safely.
This was an very important for awareness, participation, and overall appreciation of what the safety committee had to offer… and there was the key. The point was to do whatever we did to help put the focus on the rest of the people in the company, while working within the company’s overall goals. We weren’t supposed to focus just on what we wanted as a team or as individual.
Instead, we were to focus on what the company wanted in light of the employee’s perspective. That’s how you make the best employee newsletters and inter-corporation committees. There’s a lot of similarities there and I’m going to use that example to help run you through newsletters and making the best for your folks.
1) Talk To Your People
You really have to go around, whether its face by face or through email, and get ideas of what your people are looking for. I mean, do you want to talk about something that your committee is interested in, or do you want to actually talk about things that matter to folks on the ground level, mid-level, and the upper level?
You want to make sure you have a better understanding of what they’re expecting and mix that in to what you have on your plate to deliver. When you combine both sides of your goals and what people are actually looking for, you’ll find that things start to come together. You’ll find that that part of the newsletter will be filled with useful information, you’ll find that it will up participation, and you’ll find it’ll sometimes even up anticipation, which is a wonderful bonus.
2) Keep Your Eyes On The Industry
You’ve got to subscribe to blogs, you’ve got to subscribe to other newsletters, you’ve got to subscribe to trade magazines, and you’re got to subscribe to other such publications that have their pulse on the industry that you’re in.
It’s those people’s jobs to keep up to speed with the latest and greatest that’s coming out in your industry and you can save yourself a lot of time and effort by signing up for what they have to offer. You then multiply your efforts by then being a filter of that material to the rest of the people in your company. Your newsletter and its value will be upped a ton by providing that information and that service to those who read it.
3) Encourage User Submissions
Getting angry is not the key – get over it and be eager!
Now you might be hesitant to even try this, thinking that it will put a ton of workload on you, but think about it this way. What if you had a specific set of guidelines, a better understanding of the quality that’s required, and maybe even some incentivized contests all as part of your user generated content for your newsletter?
Consider allowing people to submit their articles and their news stories for your newsletter. Do this and you might just end up cutting out some work for yourself while providing great content that you know people will want to read because they submitted it themselves.
A Newsletter You’d Even Want to Read
If you’re really looking to put together the best employee newsletters for your company or team, I highly recommend you talk to your people, you keep your eyes and ears on the industry you’re in, and that you encourage user submissions. When you start to really incorporate these things into your plan and newsletter, you’ll start to see success. Why don’t you email folks now and ask for a few ideas for your next one?