25 Tips for Celebrating Your Professional Week

Promote unity and a sense of community with your team: Encourage staff to clean out their closets or pantries and bring in gently-used clothes or non-perishable food items they don’t need or use. Donate these as a group to a local homeless shelter or food bank. Or, get together as a group on a Saturday to volunteer at a nearby soup kitchen.
Remember Senior Superlatives in high school? Vote for office superlatives and create a fun poster or bulletin board. Categories can be traditional: cheeriest, best dressed, most helpful; or discipline-specific (e.g., fastest Code Blue responder, best patient educator, best vent specialist, fastest sleep staging tech).
One liners: Post a list of famous lines from movies and offer a prize for the staffer who can place the most.
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Go with a Super theme and host the big game — think queso and guacamole, wings and (root)beer. Bring in a bean bag toss for breaks or create a bracket game on likely events to happen over the course of the week.
Do you have someone on staff who hiked the length of the Appalachian Trail after college? Maybe someone who spent three years playing professional baseball in the minors before tearing his ACL? What about your therapist who recently won a ballroom dance tournament? Employees have passions outside of work-encourage each employee to bring in a few photos or mementos about their hobby and enjoy a bit of a grown-up show-and-tell.
Some fun for the staff as a group is crucial, but a gift card for a nearby restaurant allowing employees to choose their own time to celebrate with their families is always appreciated. Depending on your budget, hold a raffle for anything from a local favorite to a nearby coffeeshop.
Host a cutest pet contest. Have employees bring in photos of their furry friends and vote for your favorites.
Bring in an expert to host a wellness workshop (e.g., on nutrition, work-life balance, methods to handle stress, ways to nurture yourself).
“Now You Have It, Now You Don’t” isn’t just for holidays! Have each employee bring in an inexpensive gift to play this classic game.
Raffle unique prizes, such as an extra day off, a primo parking spot, or first crack at reimbursement for a conference or CE event.
Get to know your staff. Update a bulletin board with different facts about your coworkers, like who has a family member in the military, or who was born in a foreign country. Getting to know your colleagues can make the work environment feel like home.
Call a local massage school and get a couple of students come in to treat your staff to heavenly 10-minute massages.
Host a lunch-n-learn — buy plenty of pizzas, and invite employees from other departments to come down for a slice and a tour of your own.
It’s a classic: Guess the baby picture! Invite all staff members to bring in a picture of themselves as a baby. Create a bulletin board with all of the photos-whoever gets the most right wins a prize!
Hold a contest for staff to design a department mascot.
Use social media tools such as Facebook, Twitter and blogs to announce what your organization is doing for the week and invite comment and participation.
Reach out to nearby schools to invite field trips to the facility. Showing youngsters what it is that you do is the best way to recruit the future generation!
Host an open house for local media-including print, broadcast and radio. Give them an inside look at what it is you do.
Work with communications staff and/or the CEO to send an e-mail to all staff recognizing the start of the week.
Try a different theme day each day of the week: For Luau day, encourage employees to wear their loudest Hawaiian print shirts, purchase some leis, and bring in themed foods and decorations. Pick up some sombreros for Fiesta day, and have tacos, guacamole and salsa for lunch.
Everyone loves ice cream. Purchase a big bucket, and all the toppings, and treat your staff to a sundae-making party.
Host an Oscar-themed event to recognize the accomplishments of your staff. Sport bow-ties and boas, and serve sparkling cider. Give out awards for excellence and compliance and acknowledge long-standing employees.
Hire a group of high school students to wash employees’ cars in the parking lot.
Scavenger hunt! Yes, it’s still fun even as an adult. Divide up into teams to find hidden maps, clues and treasure around the building. Make things interesting by designing team T-shirts and, if you would really like to spice things up, make the boundaries bigger and use the whole town as your playground!