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Underneath It All by Joan Burge
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Joan Burge's Administrative Blog

Birthdays at the Office

Posted by: Joan Burge on 8/28/2009

Okay admins, I know you can help with this. Nancy wrote Jasmine a long e-mail for me to answer about how to handle office birthdays. It appears they have already covered the gamut of what to do, but still can't please everyone. Here are some of the things they have done in the past.
* Once a month cakes that the company paid for
* Ice cream, root beer floats, cupcakes
* A few individual department managers, took employees out to lunch and had presents
* One employee who loves to throw parties is doing that for others in other departments
* An authorized, off-site 75-minute luncheon for just the department
* Birthday card to each employee
* Birthday cards off the computer

The domino effects of some of the above were:
- appearing like favoritism
- hurt feelings
- boredom
- feeling forced to participate
- decrease in office productivity
- costly

Nancy, during my administrative career in various companies I saw all of the above mentioned; sometimes they were successful and sometimes not. Again, there are lots of variables involved. Unfortunately, you will never please everyone.

I am going to toss this out to our great admin community who reads my Blogs and ask for their ideas and suggestions. So, come on admins, help out your colleague Nancy!

Thank you.

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11 Comments

    • Aug 28 2009, 7:49 AM Bobbie
    • Being a person that does not like all the attention around birthdays, I much prefer just to have a card or e-mail with well-wishes for the day. Celebrating birthday in an office environment can certainly turn into a costly project. Just remember that whatever path is chosen to celebrate, the SAME thing needs to be done for EVERYONE at all times.
    • Aug 28 2009, 9:42 AM Tori
    • As far as feeling forced to participate, always make sure to ask if they want their birthday included. We've had some people not participate for religious reasons. Also, let them know up front that not everyone participates, if this is the case, for a myriad of reasons. No one really wants to feel like the outsider. They can still join in for the office event and have the dessert, if they want to. If not and if someone was trying to get them in, I've already stepped in and said they were working on something that needed to be completed very soon. It bothers me when people just don't accept, "No" as an answer.
    • Aug 31 2009, 9:38 AM Kimerley Edwards
    • I have found throughout my career that these types of celebrations help boost morale within a group and sometimes pulls together a team that may work together but not on daily basis. Three times a year we purchase a cake and pull my 3 teams together an celebrate all the things that have been happening for individuals (ie, Bdays, weddings, new babies, new homes, school, etc.)
    • Aug 31 2009, 9:53 AM Iris Shull, CPS
    • One way that I have appreciated is that a work group celebrates once a month or once a quarter for all birthdays in that time period. That works very well, with a social committee planning the event and social funds covering the expense of a treat. I've also been in a work group that has the birthday person bringing in a treat to celebrate his/her own birthday. This is an easy way for someone to choose to celebrate or not. In our company, we publish birthdays in our newsletter. People can ask that their birthday not be published and that choice is honored. Our president sends a birthday card and a small bag of cashews to each individual on their birthday. Those who want their birthday kept private receive their card/gift by personal delivery rather than in Intermail. This has been well accepted by those very private people.
    • Aug 31 2009, 9:54 AM Iris Shull, CPS
    • One way that I have appreciated is that a work group celebrates once a month or once a quarter for all birthdays in that time period. That works very well, with a social committee planning the event and social funds covering the expense of a treat. I've also been in a work group that has the birthday person bringing in a treat to celebrate his/her own birthday. This is an easy way for someone to choose to celebrate or not. In our company, we publish birthdays in our newsletter. People can ask that their birthday not be published and that choice is honored. Our president sends a birthday card and a small bag of cashews to each individual on their birthday. Those who want their birthday kept private receive their card/gift by personal delivery rather than in Intermail. This has been well accepted by those very private people.
    • Aug 31 2009, 1:20 PM Michelle Tanaka CAP
    • I do not celebrate birthdays because of my beliefs and generally this is not a problem with my office, we all respect each other's decisions. The only thing that is sometimes bothersome for me is that I have to leave the office entirely while a party is taking place since it usually occurs outside my immediate workspace. As a suggestion, if the office still would like to host a party for an individual that does not celebrate birthdays, celebrating their annual 'anniversary' of working at the office may be an option.
    • Aug 31 2009, 3:12 PM Jasmine Freeman
    • Here are some other great tips we received on Linked In! ---- Birthdays at the office - celebrate once a month - we would buy a separate card for each person's birthday and one big cake for everyone to enjoy. Four birthdays in January equals four cards and one cake. By Denise Sutak Executive Assistant/Human Resources Professional/Office Manager ---- I have worked at two companies with official methods of handling birthdays. One expected the individual whose birthday it was to bring treats for the office (about 35 people) as close to their big day as possible - this gets expensive and oppressive, as those who don't bring treats are ostracized and humiliated. The other company (about 400 employees) corporately bought bagels or something like that on the first workday of each month in honor of all employees whose birthdays fell within the month. They posted with it a list of the celebrated employees. Hope this helps! Becky Dawes Principal Virtual Assistant, 5th Avenue Virtual Assistants Posted by Becky Dawes ---- At our office, we put up a birthday poster each month that lists those that will be celebrating, and circulate a card for each. We used to do the cakes on a quarterly basis, but have discontinued that. Posted by Karen Collison ---- I agree with Denise. That is what we used to do as well. Posted by Bonita Smith ----
    • Aug 31 2009, 3:47 PM Joan Burge
    • Great ideas everyone. Thanks so much for sharing.
    • Sep 02 2009, 2:35 PM Deb
    • We used to purchase cards for each employees birthday and send it around for everyone to sign. A cake was also bought four times a year with company funds. Since the economic cruch, we have started a Birthday Club which each member contributes $10 for the whole year and a cake for the quarter birthdays is purchased with other treats and celebrated at the end of the day. Cards have gone by the wayside but personal wishes are given on their special day verbally. It has really worked out well.
    • Apr 02 2010, 10:58 AM Mary Martinez
    • In my department (employees 200) I host monthly birthday and anniversary celebrations. We honor employees/contractors who are celebrating that month. We have monthly tidbit questions for the honoree to answer. Then my executive will talk to the group in our kitchen area and tell everyone a little something about that person. Most people like it, but there are always a few negative Nancy’s or Don the dragon’s in the bunch.
    • Nov 04 2010, 5:38 AM rossa
    • I have found throughout my career that these types of celebrations help boost morale within a group and sometimes pulls together a team that may work together but not on daily basis. Three times a year we purchase a cake and pull my 3 teams together an celebrate all the things that have been happening for individuals (ie, Bdays, weddings, new babies, new homes, school, etc.)
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