An EntrLabs publication by Joseph E. Iesue.
The Lead Letter is the public editorial publication of EntrLabs. It publishes weekly Signals Briefs on leadership, service, judgment, learning, work, and the discipline of helping people rise.
Website: https://letters.entr.cc
- The Astro site for
letters.entr.cc - The published Markdown source files for each Signals Brief
- The automation and structure needed to publish new briefs cleanly
Published briefs live in:
src/content/signals/
Use clear date-title filenames:
src/content/signals/2026-w26-make-your-work-easy-to-trust.md
The writing should be public, direct, and useful.
- Write in Joseph's voice and the EntrLabs brand voice.
- Keep the reading level clear and accessible without sounding flat.
- Let callout labels do their job. Do not repeat the label in the first sentence of the callout body.
- Use
[!LEADERS]when the note is speaking directly to people responsible for others, teams, or institutions.
Signals Briefs may include an optional signalInsight block in frontmatter to shape the homepage visualization and signal map.
This block can define:
primaryThemesignalmicroconceptslanes
If it is not provided, the site derives a fallback signal read from the title, description, tags, and body of the note.
add Markdown file to src/content/signals/ -> push to main -> GitHub Actions builds Astro -> GitHub Pages publishes letters.entr.cc
No manual site editing should be required after the Markdown file is pushed.
The SendFox workflow can create a draft campaign when a new Signals Brief is added. It does not call the SendFox send endpoint.
Required GitHub secrets:
SENDFOX_API_TOKENSENDFOX_LIST_ID
Useful GitHub variables:
SENDFOX_SEND_ENABLED: set totrueonly when GitHub should create SendFox draftsSENDFOX_FROM_NAME: defaults toThe Lead LetterSENDFOX_FROM_EMAIL: defaults toletters@entr.cc
The campaign payload uses SendFox's Lifetime-compatible body HTML shape: inline-styled <body>...</body> HTML, from_name, from_email, lists, and an unsubscribe link using {{unsubscribe_url}}.
Use the manual GitHub Actions workflow named Test Send Lead Letter Email to test a weekly email before sending to the real list.
Inputs:
signal_file: the Signals Brief markdown file to testtest_list_id: a SendFox list ID that should contain only the test recipientsend_to_test_list: leave off to create a draft only; turn on to send that draft to the test list
The test workflow uses the normal SendFox token but replaces the audience with the provided test list ID. The send step is guarded by SENDFOX_TEST_SEND_ENABLED=true and only runs from that manual workflow.
The Prepare Monthly Lead Letter Catch-Up workflow runs on the 15th of each month at 12:00 UTC. It creates a SendFox draft containing the four latest Signals Briefs in newest-to-oldest order, followed by two directly linked Field Notes. It never calls the SendFox send endpoint.
Set SENDFOX_MONTHLY_ENABLED=true as a GitHub Actions variable to allow scheduled draft creation. Leave it false to keep scheduled runs as validated dry runs.
The two Field Notes can be curated in a manual workflow run with a comma-separated pair of filenames. Without a curated pair, the generator uses the latest eligible Field Note and one from the middle of the four-week window. Use as_of in a manual run to preview the selection for a particular date.
- EntrLabs: https://entr.cc/entrlabs
- EntrLabs Frameworks: https://github.com/entrlabs/frameworks
- Service Leadership Field Guide: https://github.com/josephiesue/service-leadership-field-guide
- Joseph E. Iesue: https://josephiesue.com