As a leader in a supportive school system, one of the best relationship strategies I agreed to implement was to send a personal card to employees for “doing little things.”  It worked like this:  at our  leadership meetings, each person was asked to share the name and story of a staff member who was making a positive difference.  On average, I would receive 15-20 suggested names.  I would hand write each card (“Dear Jim, At our recent leadership meeting, Mrs. Smith shared with us that she noticed that you are working with students after school each day. Thank you for your efforts to help our students be the best they can be.  In appreciation, David”)

The strategy was very effective, but it was killing me.  The time became a burden, and I did not always get the cards our in a timely fashion. In 2007, I started using SendOutCards – an Internet-based company that enables you to create a real paper greeting card online, type your message, and click SEND.  SendOutCards does the rest – printing, stuffing, licking, stamping (with a real stamp), addressing, and taking it to the post office for you on whatever date you want it mailed.  Here are some of my favorite features: They’ll print your message with your own “handwriting” font and signature. You can ask them to add a gift card or even have them send a physical gift with your card (gift boxes filled with such things as gourmet candy, nuts, brownies, cookies, coffee, tea, and cocoa). For less than a dollar per card, you can create a custom card with your own digital photo.  Remember, SendOutCards does all the work, so you are receiving a product (card) AND a service (preparation of the mailing)…a huge time and money saver. There’s a campaign feature built into the system, so you can type your message once, then create a group (several staff, friends or family, for example), and ask SendOutCards to mail that card to each person in the group. 

When SendOutCards prints your cards, they insert the recipients’ name(s) into each card, so the message is personalized.  Also, after you click “send” and before it gets printed, you can edit individual cards in a campaign to make each card more personal. I liked this service so much and found it to be such an incredible communication tool that I became a distributor for SendOutCards  (www.sendoutcards.com/27634).

If you would more information about using SendOutCards  to enhance your school relationships, contact me by email (dbrobeck@staffexcel.com) or call 330-853-2201.  I’ll help you determine if this could assist you and your mission to serve.