The best organizations don’t just have the best products or the top wages. They also have executives and middle managers who appreciate their employees each and every day. It’s no stretch to say that employee appreciation is one of the most essential things to keep in mind when running a business, especially a small enterprise.

But while it’s not exactly practical to take the time out of each day to individually appreciate each team member, you can channel your appreciation for your entire workforce into a single day: Employee Appreciation Day. Officially, National Employee Appreciation Day is on the first Friday of March (March 3, 2023). But, this method is so effective that many businesses have monthly, quarterly, or yearly Employee Appreciation Days on the schedule.

Let’s take a closer look at employee appreciation day and how to celebrate it with a few stellar ideas.

Why Should You Celebrate Employee Appreciation Day

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Before we dive into specific ideas and suggestions, let's cover a few background bases first. After all, if you've been running your company successfully so far, you might wonder why designated employee appreciation days are necessary in the first place.

Truth be told, there are several reasons to implement employee appreciation days at your company ASAP. They don’t have to be too frequent, but having an old-fashioned get-together or office party every quarter or every month can provide your company with significant benefits.

Boosted Employee Engagement

For starters, Employee Appreciation Day can lead to improved employee engagement across the board. How?

It's partly thanks to bringing your employees together and giving them a chance to see their workplace as a collaborative unit. It's easy to think in terms of my department or my team when you're at a big company. But when we see all the other people our work affects, we’re much more likely to think of our company as a shared effort.

In addition, Employee Appreciation Day can lead to boosted employee engagement by making your employees happier. In the winter, for example, it’s easy for everyone’s moods to plummet a bit.

But a party where everyone gets together and enjoys gift cards from management, like customized eGift cards from Prezzee, can help lift collective spirits. It gives everyone the extra energy they need to finish up the first quarter strong, especially with the holiday season behind us.

People thrive off positive reinforcement. Recognizing all manner of achievements — large and small — is part of what makes a good boss a great boss.

Improved Company Culture

Similarly, Employee Appreciation Day can improve company culture. Your company culture is essentially the specific culture or workplace “vibe” that your employees see and experience every day. If you have a positive, supportive workplace culture, odds are your employees will continue to love to work at your company.

Fostering a “culture of appreciation” helps bring in more top talent in the years to come. Look at it this way — we’d never try to set up a blind date for a friend with someone we didn’t like. Reputations follow corporations like baby ducklings; a positive culture ensures top performers are more likely to refer highly-qualified colleagues to come and join the party.

Higher Employee Retention

These days, many employees are unwilling to work for organizations that don’t offer a stellar culture where they can grow and thrive in a professional context. With the constant influx of remote work opportunities, it’s easier than ever to leave an unfulfilling organization in favor of a supportive one.

Negative workplace cultures lead to mass resignations, low productivity, and a bunch of other problems. Voluntary turnover costs U.S. businesses roughly one trillion dollars a year. In the long term, it’s far more profitable to make business an enjoyable place to work for all employees by highlighting and improving company culture at every opportunity.

Ultimately, a culture of appreciation can lead to higher employee retention. That’s a big benefit, especially considering that lots of companies struggle to keep rock-star employees at their companies over the long haul.

Employee Appreciation Day gives your company a chance to show just why your best employees should stick with your company through thick and thin. This is healthy for your bottom line and your workforce — the more new hires you have to train, the less productive your company will be overall.

Bring Remote and In-Office Employees Together

Lastly, Employee Appreciation Day can be especially valuable if you have some of your employees working remotely (part-time or full-time). Many remote employees can feel a little disconnected from the office culture, especially if they don’t get to socialize in person with their coworkers outside of work.

With an Employee Appreciation Day celebration every once in a while, remote work and in-office employees can have a fantastic time together in the office or elsewhere, depending on your plans.

Depending on how far apart your employees are, you might want to consider flying some in, if possible. Otherwise, you might centralize the get-together around the main office location or at different hubs highly populated by large numbers of employees. If neither of these is feasible, bring everyone together over a Zoom party!

How Often Should Companies Celebrate Employee Appreciation Day?

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Actions speak louder than words, and Employee Appreciation Day is the opportunity to showcase your acknowledgment of their daily sacrifices more directly than ever.

Consider holding an appreciation day at least once per year, although once per quarter is even better. As soon as you have more than 20 or so employees, regular events are even more important because:

• It gives you a chance to connect and communicate with employees at your brand that you may not notice or speak to on a day-to-day basis, given its size.
• It allows your employees to congregate together in a social setting, helping your company feel more like a comprehensive, collaborative unit.

Bottom line: not hosting an Employee Appreciation Day won’t get you investigated by OSHA or your country’s department of labor, but as business leaders, we’re never content with the bare minimum. We set an example by going above and beyond — just like our employees do each and every day.

Where To Celebrate Employee Appreciation Day

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When the time comes to plan Employee Appreciation Day, first decide where the celebration will take place. Good news: The sky’s the limit!

Let’s take a look at some examples:

Host an In-Office After-Hours Party

You can host your Employee Appreciation Day in the office after work ends. For example, rather than having everyone go home, invite them to stick around at your corporate headquarters or at your retail branch for a few hours of socialization and fun games. Better yet, instead of working after lunch, dedicate the rest of the day to the festivities!

There's no limit to the fun activities you can host and lead at an in-office after-hours party, like board games, trivia games, and much more. Additionally, in-office after-hours parties are usually cost-effective (since you don't have to buy tickets to an event for everyone in your company). Before setting up any board games, make sure to clear them with HR.

You may want to submit a company-wide poll or suggestion box for people to recommend their favorites. This serves a dual purpose of making sure everyone has a voice and drums up excitement over the impending holiday.

Treat Everyone to a Cocktail Party or Restaurant Reception

Some managers prefer to host an after-hours happy hour party or restaurant reception. For many employees, it’s easier to unwind and socialize without talking about work if get-togethers take place outside the office.

Managers and business owners might want to consider footing the bill for the event. This highlights the “employees first” message of the day.

Take a Field Trip to a Local Hotspot

Want to get a little adventurous? In that case, take the entire office on a field trip to a local hotspot, like a museum, a local park with beautiful views, or similar. Field trips give everyone a chance to stretch their legs and enjoy the weather, at least in the warmer parts of the year.

In some cases, you can combine a field trip with a team-building activity, like a scavenger hunt around the downtown area or the park.

Take the Office to an Escape Room

Escape rooms are some of the most fun team-building activities you can plan for your workers, so they are perfect for business-centric holidays. Many escape room businesses even have discounts that will kick in as you invite more workers.

Fully remote and hybrid teams can still enjoy escape rooms. When the pandemic hit, escape rooms over Zoom boomed in popularity and are still going strong. Virtual escape rooms vary in length (with many around 90 minutes), and teams typically consist of four to six players. They involve puzzle-solving, creative thinking, and cooperative playing.

Since managing an event of this size and complexity can be tricky, consider inviting different groups of employees to Employee Appreciation Day escape rooms in batches. Host one group on one day of the week, another group on another day of the week, and so on. You may want to divide groups by teams or group together people who don’t typically work together to form new friendships.

Schedule a Half-Day Before the Weekend

Everyone likes an extra day off. So there may be no better way to show your appreciation for your employees than to give everyone a chance to clock out about half a day early on a Friday before the weekend kicks in. Some call it “summer Fridays;” at Prezzee, we call this Friyay!

Team members of all levels will appreciate the extra time to spend with their loved ones. Note that you can combine a lot of these ideas — for example, you can host an in-office, after-hours party but officially end the workday at noon and give the employees the opportunity to do either.

Try These Employee Appreciation Day Ideas

Now that you’ve decided where your Employee Appreciation Day should take place, it’s time to fire up your imagination to decide which gifts and surprises will ensure this day is worthy of a LinkedIn humble brag post from your employees.

Here are some specific gifts and incentives you can adopt to keep the celebration lively:

Give Out Employee Appreciation Gifts

Giving your employees direct gifts is a surefire way to make each employee appreciation day a moment to remember. eGift cards from Prezzee are excellent examples — these cards can be customized with your business’s brand, personalized with a special message, and given to individual employees at a set date and time.

Keep employee gift preferences in mind when putting together presents. The last thing you want to do is provide a gift to an employee that they won’t use. While some might want to ask their HR department to draw up a list of gifts based on employee interests, this puts an unfair burden on some team members.

That’s why with Prezzee, eGift card recipients can swap one gift card for another they prefer, or for several — no extra work for anyone involved, which is a gift in and of itself.

Send Out Care Packages

Employees love care packages, which can include company swag, free office supplies, or small goodies. Or, wrap office-centric gear like water bottles or personalized nameplates for each employee’s desk.

Care packages, including fluffy socks, face masks, and snacks, are another classic option. Complete the package with a health-themed eGift card that your employee can use to purchase whatever they need to unwind on the weekend.

Reveal New Perks and Wellness Initiatives

Alternatively, reveal new perks or benefits, like wellness initiatives (such as gym memberships or eGift cards to top fitness brands) or improvements to the break room.

New office perks are always popular, and they’re a great way to funnel some of the money your employees have made back into your business for overall improved productivity and workplace culture.

Acknowledge Employee Birthdays

On any given employee appreciation day, the odds are at least a few employees will have birthdays around the big date. So why not highlight those birthdays each time you get the chance?

To ensure no one feels left out, consider making a special note and giving a gift to each employee with a birthday in the same quarter as the employee appreciation day. Besides a few of these gift ideas, give a shout-out to birthdays on Slack or over email. (Before doing this, check with the staff member of honor if they’d like this; some might not like the extra attention.)

This is a small touch, but one that your employees will doubtless remember for a long time to come!

Bring in Donuts, Ice Cream, and Other Goodies

Nothing says “office party” like company-wide free snacks and sweet treats for your employees to enjoy. Consider picking up a box of donuts and a few tubs of ice cream before the day begins. The donuts will start the day off on the right foot, and the ice cream lets everyone end the work week on a sweet note.

For remote workers who won’t be able to participate, send them an eGift card for snacks so that all bellies are full and all the faces are smiling.

Shout Out Rock-Stars With an Employee Recognition Program

Employee recognition programs, like an employee of the month program, can do wonders to foster healthy competition in your office and show successful employees that you recognize their dedication and results.

That's more important than you may realize. All employees thrive off of extra recognition. When given the chance to shine, rock-star employees are more dedicated, satisfied, and less likely to experience burnout.

Highlighting the employees with the most sales, best record, or other major developments can give those top-tier workers the respect and admiration they deserve. It also shows other employees (in a kind way) what they can achieve as they grow with the company.

Or, to celebrate everyone at your business, consider highlighting anniversaries, like employees who’ve worked for your company for ten, 15, and 20 years. Smaller companies, like start-ups, can celebrate milestones in the six-month, one or two-year span.

Every Day Is Employee Appreciation Day
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In the end, staff appreciation days are about showing your workers that you see their great work and value them for their unique perspectives. Put together the right Employee Appreciation Day, and your workforce will be more committed to your brand than ever, plus be more unified when helping your company succeed.

eGift cards from Prezzee are one way to make this special day that much more meaningful for your talented employee base. With over 360 brands available, and the ability to customize the cards with company logos or a custom video, each card has a personal touch.

With Prezzee, you can add a brand logo, specify how much each gift card is worth, and give your employees a chance to swap retailers so that each card is valuable for each recipient. Sign up for a free account on Prezzee Business to make the next Employee Appreciation Day truly magical.

Sources:

Managing for Employee Retention | SHRM.org

What Is Employee Engagement | Forbes

NATIONAL EMPLOYEE APPRECIATION DAY - March 3, 2023 | National Day

How to Show Employees You Appreciate Them | Business News Daily

Here are the 5 Steps to Creating a Culture of Appreciation | HR Executive

This Fixable Problem Costs U.S. Businesses $1 Trillion | Gallup

Here’s How Smart Companies Tackle Burnout Using Employee Appreciation | Forbes

What Are Summer Fridays? | Business News Daily

What my team learned in a virtual escape room | QZ