We’ve been doing virtual summer and holidays parties since Covid and our main challenge has been coming up with new virtual ideas that are engaging, that work for everyone, and is flexible for folks in different time zones. To solve this issue, for our virtual holiday party this year, we decided to celebrate over a three week period. Week 1 our employees have two events to choose from (an online Mixology class or a Thai cooking class). Week 2 is focused on Health & Fun and people can choose one event (Learning how to stretch at your desk or a tote bag painting class) and Week 3 is all about celebrating all our hard work over the last year with multiple events taking place (virtual team lunches, a company wide trivia event, and a final cheers and celebration message from our Leadership team). So for us, having multiple events for employees to choose from will allow more people to attend at least one of them. It also let us come up with multiple virtual ideas, rather than stressing over finding one that works for everyone.

Other: blind-sided by c-suite with arbitrary return to office date and dictation of what those days will be, while also only applying the mandate to some teams. Additionally, middle management giving conflicting opinions with individual teams

This makes total sense, and I like the idea of celebrating for a longer period, super fun!