Tips for Organizing a Holiday Office Party

The holidays are the perfect time to celebrate your employees and all their hard work throughout the year, so many businesses take this time to throw a holiday party. While the planning may seem overwhelming at first, you’ll have everything ready before you know it once you break it down. Follow these tips for organizing a holiday office party so that you don’t forget anything along the way.

Choose the Best Time for Your Party

The first things you’ll want to nail down for your office’s holiday party are the details like date, time, and location. Iron out these specifics first so that you can let your employees and guests know the details in advance. This will give you plenty of time to prepare the event and venue, and it also helps boost attendance as your guests can plan for it. Give some thought to whether you want to hold the party on a workday, such as during everyone’s lunch hour, or outside of work hours.

Don’t Forget the Basics

There can be a lot to plan out when preparing an office party, but don’t forget the basics. Make sure you order plenty of food through a caterer or local business, supply drinks, and have all the utensils you’ll need ready. To manage the litter and clutter around the building, you might want to rent or purchase a few more garbage cans or recycling bins.

Plan Activities

If you plan to have your holiday party extend beyond an hour or so for lunch, you may want to plan out some activities in advance. To get your employees in the giving spirit, you could organize a white elephant or secret Santa gift exchange. Or you could encourage everyone to wear ugly sweaters and vote on who’s is best/ugliest. For even more ideas, you could decorate gingerbread houses, watch a holiday movie, and more—the options are almost endless.

Throwing a successful holiday party is all in the planning process. If you do your planning ahead of time and follow these tips for organizing a holiday office party, your event is sure to succeed.