March 3, 2023 is Employee Appreciation Day. Every year, it is the first Friday in March.
Covid-19 has changed the way that many employers interact with their employees, but that shouldn’t stop you from celebrating Employee Appreciation Day. With many employees working remotely or socially distanced at work, expressing your gratitude has probably become more of a concerted effort.
Many managers report that distance working has required them to be more intentional about expressing appreciation to their employees. Because the in-person “pat on the back”, or expression of Thanks as you pass their workspace is not an option for remote workers, the little, consistent acts of recognition have to be forged purposefully.
But, even though you may have remote employees, it’s important to still celebrate employee appreciation day. Here are 12 ways you can remotely celebrate together.
1. Video Messages
As employee appreciation day approaches, be sure to use short videos to send a message to your employees. During the Employee Appreciation week, usually, the week Employee Appreciation Day (The First Friday in March), send your employees a video presentation that highlights some of the many differences your team has made to the company.
Be sure to highlight each department and something extraordinary that they accomplished this year. Some ideas include:
- Featuring customer comments or feedback on positive differences employees made
- Greetings by the leadership that highlight each departments’ success
- Feature employees in a video highlight
- Record an individual message for each employee thanking them for their individual contributions
- Encourage team members to record and send messages to colleagues
- Encourage team leaders to record messages for each of their teams
Although an individual video message may take time and work, employees will notice that effort and will feel more appreciated that a general message will inspire.
2. Appreciation Theme
A theme is vital for any party, and it’s especially important to a virtual party. For Employee Appreciation Day, consider choosing a theme of appreciation. For example, consider a humorous spin to your appreciation. Instead of celebrating the obvious and large accomplishments, celebrate the little funny ones. The first time your new employee Joe, made himself a cup of joe. Celebrate Susan’s love of sticky notes, or the day Mike had a clean desk. Personalizing and humorizing your celebration shows your employees you know and care about them. Be sure to keep your celebrations light and avoid any embarrassing situations.
Another theme idea is to celebrate employees from a customer standpoint. Choose from a Thanks theme to dress up your employee recognition throughout the month and utilize banners and widgets to match the theme.
Create a poll around the company culture and find out what aspects your employees enjoy the most.
3. Photo Booth
A photo booth adds classic fun to any party or celebration. On Employee Appreciation Day, you can still incorporate photos into your celebration. Since your employees are remote and you want to celebrate them, consider giving them a professional photo to your employees. This can be done through a local photographer or photo studio. Many people intend to get professional photos, but put it off.
Gifting them a photo adds a personal touch to your gift giving and shows them its not all about advancing the corporate goals- its about them! Allow them to take either an individual photo for professional purposes or to have a family photo done.
Celebrate each employee by compiling a video of your employees and the photos and sharing it on the Thanks platform.
4. Employee Appreciation Exchanges Made Fun
Instead of showering your employees with a generic gift today, consider really spreading the appreciation around. Employees report that they feel the most appreciated when recognition is personal and from peers. SPOT awards make peer recognition easy and fun! See how they work
In the next few months, start collecting stories and notes from your employees about each other. Make sure to collect notes that recognize each employee so that no one is left out.
Use the Announcement feature on Thanks to announcing the initiative and invite employees to share as many stories of gratitude and appreciation for each other as they would like. Join the conversation by having managers add comments and emphasize individual talents and contributions. Explore what each one has to say and join the fun!
- Turn the comments into a video slide that highlights contributions
- Add comments and accompanying photos to a photo book and print a copy for each employee to enjoy
- Please print out the notes of appreciation and post them around the office for all to read or post appreciation to the Thanks Wall of Fame for all employees to see.
- Create a virtual hall of fame and highlight employees on social media and your company website for their contributions.
Peer recognition is often more personal, more effective, and more meaningful than top-down recognition. Engaging your employees in a celebration of each other engages employees and helps to build greater bonds, especially during a time of remote work.
5. Quizzes
Use the quizzes function of Thanks to host company-wide or department-specific quizzes. Use them as the foundation of getting-to-know-you games and employee spotlights. Use Employee Appreciation Day to get to know and build the team, even if you have to do it remotely.
Or, use Quizzes to test employees about company history and give out prizes to the most knowledgeable employee.
See a demo of how Quizzes works to recognize employees.
6. Individual Gifts of Appreciation
Just because your employees are remote doesn’t mean that you can’t give them a thank-you gift. Personalized gifts are the most effective but can be hard to ship or deliver to each employee.
Instead of individually choosing and awarding to employees, use the Thanks points to gift employees to choose their own gifts according to their preferences.
7. Party in A Box
In the next few months, start collecting stories and notes from your employees about each other. Make sure to collect notes that recognize each employee so that no one is left out.
Use the Announce feature on Thanks to announce the initiative and invite employees to share as many stories of gratitude and appreciation for each other as they would like. Join the conversation by having managers add comments and emphasize individual talents and contributions. Explore what each one has to say and join the fun!
- Turn the comments into a video slide that highlights contributions
- Add comments and accompanying photos to a photo book and print a copy for each employee to enjoy
- Print out the notes of appreciation and post them around the office for all to read or post appreciation to the Thanks Wall of Fame for all employees to see.
- Create a virtual hall of fame and highlight employees on social media and your company website for their contributions.
Peer recognition is often more personal, more effective, and more meaningful than top-down recognition. Engaging your employees in a celebration of each other engages employees and helps to build greater bonds, especially during a time of remote work.
Send or deliver to your employees a box full of celebration items. Be sure to include a hand-written note thanking them for their hard work and individual contributions. Have the boxes delivered on Employee Appreciation Day.
You can include confetti, candy or treats, and a gift card. You can add printed notes from colleagues, photos of past events, and notes from customers.
8. Entertainment
Often on Employee Appreciation Day teams get to party and celebrate together. It’s a little harder when your team members are working remotely. However, you can still provide them with some laughter and shared experiences by hiring virtual entertainment.
Hire a motivational speaker pre-record a talk for your employees. Check out these other entertainment ideas:
- Motivational speaker
- Magician
- Mind reading
- Musicians
- Comedian
- Key influencer in a specific niche
9. Flexible Time
In lieu of hiring out entertainment, consider giving your employees a little extra flex time to celebrate on their own. Give them the afternoon off, or add an extra day to their PTO for them to use later at their preference.
Flex time demonstrates that you care about their personal time and relaxation time and not just when they are at the office! Post extra PTO to the company store for employees to redeem their as one of their recognition award options.
10. Festive Games
If you choose to celebrate Employee Appreciation Day remotely, but together, there are a lot of group games you can play vía video conference. No party is complete without fun games.
Check out these fun ideas:
- Theme based Charades
- Pictonary
- Trivia: movie trivia, music trivia, a book-based trivia
- Three truths and a lie
- Photo of your life: Employees share a photo that shows something about them and explains it. This can be a photo of their pet, coffee mug, favorite tv show, kids, view from their window, anything!
11. Community Contributions As a Team
While many employees enjoy a great celebration, a sincere note, or a personalized gift, most also value community contributions. To help you decide what causes, charities, or social issues your employees care about, use Thanks Polls. Choose one of the popular causes and hold a company-wide drive. Match employee contributions and encourage employees to record the time they spend helping out the cause.
Celebrate together and emphasize that the difference is made through and by your employees and their contributions.
12. ECards
Follow up with a personalized ecard through Thanks. Write individual notes on how much fun you had getting to know them better. Be sure to take notes so you can make the card personalized, especially for remote or newer employees you may not know as well.
Employees can also send each other ecards through Thanks. Use the gift feature to send your earned reward points along with your wishes and make your colleague feel special. Check out how it works here
About Thanks
Thanks is a leading provider of a recognition-based platform that increases communication, builds teamwork, and makes recognition a part of company culture. Fast, easy and simple Thanks makes it easy to bring data-driven employee recognition to your entire organization. O.C. Tanner purchased the Thanks platform in 2019 to fulfill the recognition needs of smaller businesses.
Thanks customers benefit from the same decades of research in employee motivation and company culture that O.C. Tanner enterprise clients enjoy, but in a product that is geared for fast, easy and simple deployment. Whether you’re starting a recognition program or improving and expanding on what you already have, Thanks has everything you need to engage your people with effective, scalable recognition. Thanks is a subsidiary of OC Tanner.