A new teammate joined us last month. She is great fun to have around, and watching her settle in got me thinking about something. When you join a new team, what is the first thing you actually need to do? The instinct is to prove you belong. You want to show them they made the right call, so you go looking for something big to fix, fast.
That instinct is usually wrong.
Every time I point out something for her to learn, she pulls back a little. That is completely natural, we all do it. So I keep telling her the same thing. In your first couple of months nobody is judging you on the brilliant thing you shipped. They are watching something quieter. Do you do what you said you would do? Do you show up when you said you would? When you do not know something, do you say so, or do you bluff?
Trust on a new team is not built on impressive work. It is built on small reliability, repeated.
What actually earns trust early
Reply when you say you will. Finish the small task before you reach for the big one. Ask the question you are slightly embarrassed to ask, because the person next to you was wondering the same thing and did not say it either.
Learn names. Learn how the team actually works. And listen more than you talk. Simon sinek (A known leader) put it well your perspective is worth more in week six than in week one, when you do not yet know what you do not know.
You will see things you want to change. Write them down. Do not say them all out loud yet. Half of what looks broken from the outside has a reason you cannot see from where you are standing, and one's once said the fastest way to lose a room is to walk in and start fixing things nobody asked you to touch.
The other half really is broken. You will have far more credit to fix it in month three, once people trust that you understand how it got that way.
If you are the one welcoming someone
Most of this lands on the new person. But a lot of it sits with you, the team that is already there.
Tell them what you wish someone had told you. Introduce them to the person who actually knows how things work. Make it safe to ask the embarrassed question. And when they pull back at a correction, remember they are not being difficult, they are just trying to belong. The faster someone feels like they belong, the faster they start contributing, and the teammate who felt welcomed is a better one than the teammate who spent a month quietly anxious.
The first 30 days are not about proving you are smart. Everyone assumed that when they hired you. They are about becoming someone the team can rely on. The smart part shows up on its own, later, once you have earned the room.
· Abdallah
Currently the one doing the welcoming, and trying to be the colleague I describe above.