5th October, 2021

As a time when I’m thinking a lot about welcoming new members of our team, I’m reflecting on those times in my career when I’ve been thankful to be welcomed. I’ve lived away from home in a handful of places over the years. No trip intimidated me more than a 4-month research secondment to Germany.

In January, 2014, I landed in Frankfurt airport, as tired as I was bitterly cold. A bus later dropped me off in a village on the outskirts of the city. With a crumpled map, I navigated the unfamiliar silence and eventually came to terrace where I’d be staying. I met my host and, through his non-existent English and my scant German, we figured out an exchange of keys and phone numbers and schedules. I dumped my bag on my bed and looked for the WiFi password so I could reach out to those at home. Nothing. I wandered the streets looking for late-opening restaurants or internet cafes. Fast forward to when it was time to return to the UK, and I was desperately sorry to leave.

The first lonely nights in a new town, with new people, new language, new sights, new colleagues…it was scary. Terrifying, really. And it never would have evolved into one of the best professional trips of my life had it not been for the warmth and welcoming nature of those who each greeted me with open arms. From my landlord to his English-fluent nephew, and from young German students to my senior mangers in the company I was visiting. All of them, in their small acts of kindness, made a bigger impact on me than they can ever know.

To those, then, who would be willing to come work with our team, I try to radiate nothing but the lasting warmth of those who had welcomed me, when I was the one to be moving to an intimidating new place.

It’s always worth considering this through grateful lens:

How could you be as welcoming as the times you were most relieved to be welcomed?

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