Welcome Wednesday: Celebrating Work Anniversaries!

[#1]

Happy Wednesday Everyone!

By pure luck, today just happens to be my 2nd anniversary at my company.

In the past, celebrating anniversaries has been something that was done as an employee led and organized excursion. In the past I have down a number of things to celebrate from bringing in a few dozen donuts to making French Toast for everyone interested.

At my current company, they celebrate anniversaries by providing a little "care package" to everyone in partnership with a local company called Chocolate Soup. I have a little Lego character on my desk that represents me and I get to add blocks to represent milestones while being at my company as well as some locally sourced goodies.

My question to all of you this week is do you, or does your company do anything to celebrate work anniversaries, and if so what do you do?

Let me know in the comments below!

Have a great rest of the week!

[Ebe]

Employees who reach milestones are celebrated in All Staff monthly meetings and a gift card is also given.

[Samie Kaufman - Your Gal at Gliffy]

The lego idea is adorable! I like that it can be company events and milestones as well as your tenure.

Something that we recently started doing that I really appreciate is including anniversaries and birthdays on the monitors at the entrance to our office. It's a nice way to have a little extra visibility so that when I run into someone, I can congratulate them or wish them a happy birthday.

Samie

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

We have weekly "show and tell", usually attended by 1/2 - 2/3rds of the company, and there's a section on "who had an anniversary this week".

We've started giving out swag tokens to people with a longer term service, and special items on the store for long terms of service have appeared for a couple of people. 

I don't know if there are other rewards we do on anniversaries, I might find out in 9 months if we do something special for a decade of Adaptavist!

[Laura Holton _ACE Rotterdam_]

I just marked a year at Valiantys and received a special shoutout on our weekly huddle as well as a milestone achievement on our Kudos program. The best part was really just hearing the kind words from the team!

Don't even get me started on how they mark birthdays... I'm still trying to lose the cake weight from July 😂 Valiantys are very pro celebrating all milestones big or small which I think is a nice touch. It shows the company cares 😊 (though I would absolutely love a lego milestone tracker... @Jimmy Seddon that is awesome!)

[Benjamin]

The idea of legos is great!

The organization I work work has announcements for the anniversaries. Gifts for folks who have been with the company for certain milestone periods.

[Taranjeet Singh]

Thank for this great post and topic, @Jimmy Seddon ! And, Happy 2nd Work Anniversary!

My previous employer had a dedicated Slack channel for wishing birthdays and work anniversaries to the employees as well as a monthly newsletter to highlight (@ mention) employees whose birthdays and work anniversaries fall within that month.

My current employer only have a dedicated Slack channel for wishing birthdays and work anniversaries. And I do not get any extra gifts or rewards from the company, maybe because I am a contractor with them and not a full-time employee.

Have a great rest of the week, everyone!

[Summer Hogan]

Great topic @Jimmy Seddon and the lego's rock! 

At my company for my first year I got a book that has a personal note from the CEO and little notes from all my coworkers. Prior to an anniversary, an email is sent out and all your coworkers get to add notes to your book. See picture below. For year 2 and beyond we get a plaque or trophy of some sort (they are all different) and the same book. I am about to have my second anniversary at my company and have not received my 2nd year book (and whatever comes with it) yet. 

[Nic Brough -Adaptavist-]

I have been reminded of another one tonight.

Chrissy (my partner) works for a small accountancy firm, around 75 people now.  They've got two offices; Chrissy is the admin for one, and Julie is the admin for the other.  

Julie has been there almost since they started and she had a big anniversary a few months ago.  Her son lives in Dubai and was planning to deliver her first grandchild in August-ish, so she had planned a near-Christmas trip to see them.

The company wanted to do something a bit bigger and more meaningful than a t-shirt or a bonus, so they flew her out there for a week as soon as they could after the birth, on paid leave (on top of her normal allowance)

[Lauren Allen]

OMG!  That is so awesome of your company.  I love seeing those kind of little things that bring joy. And as a total Lego nerd, I'm also pretty jealous! Happy 2yr anniversary!

Our company celebrates everyone's work anniversary by announcing it on our company slack channel for everyone to share the love and congratulations.  Also for birthday's and any other important milestones both private and professional.  It's like a big group hug in an otherwise remote workforce. :)

In a previous company, we would get a compendium at 1 year, an additional week holiday at 5years, 2weeks at 10 years and so on.  

Another company we got a Tiffany necklace or tiepin at 5 years, $1000 at 10 years and so on. 

[Nicole Christensen]

Wow! All of these are amazing! It goes to show that leadership is more about the people and when leadership takes care of staff by recognizing these important milestones, individuals are more likely to stay. 

The only time I received a work anniversary gift was when I was teaching Literature and Writing at a local high school. When I reached my 5 year anniversary, I received a watch with the district logo on the watch face. It was really kind and special to be remembered.

Another school I taught at was an online program for grades K-12 and each year there was a picnic for teachers the last day. That was when anniversaries were recognized, but we were just given a created certificate on paper. We did receive more PTO time once we reached various milestones. 

[Andy Gladstone]

@Jimmy Seddon Happy Anniversary!

My company has a few ways of celebrating and publicizing work anniversaries.

1. Each month the company intranet homepage and the HR/Payroll homepage are updated with the names of those celebrating work anniversaries that month. It's amazing to see the longevity and tenure many of our employees have, and is a great recruiting tool as well.
2. The info kiosks around the office, which cycle our most recent metrics and advertisements also displays this list.
3. Each year the Ops team comes up with a new gift idea. 2022 were personalized Camelback Stainless Steel Water Bottles that were personalized with the team member's name or nickname. They have been a big hit and you can see people swigging/chugging/refilling them all day long in the office. They are wrapped with a hand written card and placed by each team member's desk at the beginning of the anniversary month. With many remote and WFH employees we make sure to ship them too. 

I personally like to celebrate my work anniversary by publishing a reflection post internally and a more personal note to the CEO each year. 6.5 years and counting at the current company!

[Kristján Geir Mathiesen]

Great topic @Jimmy Seddon !

I changed jobs this last May. I had been almost 22 years at my last job. They have a nice watch they give you on your 10 year anniversary. Then recognitions at the annual company party for 15, 20, 25, 30 years, I think.