How to Throw the Most Enjoyable Employee Holiday Party Ever

by Michael, Zhou, Guest Contributor

It is not customary but a necessity on the part of companies to throw holiday parties for their employees. Since employees are arguably the most strategic assets for businesses, they therefore deserve to be appreciated and given opportunity to relax and celebrate.
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Thinking of creating an awesome party and need some more tips?
​Here's a great guide by Events Papparazzi on that subject.

Do you realize how important is it for you to host a holiday party for your employees? To begin with, it breeds a sense of composite culture. It’s a perfect opportunity to demonstrate what you are all about. Holiday parties are a great morale booster for your staff who get re-energized with tons of optimism. Finally, such occasional celebrations help your employees get to know one another, and subsequently learn the value of team work.

But how are you planning to throw a spot-on holiday party for your employees?

Here are some valuable tips that will save your time and efforts for sure:

1. Plan It Early
It’s not a cakewalk to organize a party of this scale, so you have to plan it and carve out details as early as possible. Party planning really takes a lot of time and commitment. You should save yourself from the last minute glitches, for there might arise issues like budget or orders. In addition to that, the location matters a lot. So, if you don’t start your proceedings early, your appropriate location would possibly be grabbed up some other party.

2. Pick A Theme
An engaging theme can aid in making your party more enjoyable for all your guests and staff. However, whatever theme you will choose, make sure it is suitable for them. A simple theme you can choose for example is a color scheme. One good source for further theme ideas is to find out what is popular while you are planning your event. Just imagine how exciting it will look when everyone come there wearing masquerade masks. Furthermore, you can ask all your guests to bring costumes of their favorite superheroes.

3. Foods And Beverages
As an old saying goes, a well-fed guest is the happy guest. So when it comes to feasting, everyone loves to leave only after getting satiated fully. It would be nice idea to hire a caterer who can help the attendees enjoy the delicacies. Start by delighting all your staff members with some surprising appetizers, and them a few types of cocktails with a signature drink. In order to have a big toast with your guests, you can create custom liquor labels that are appropriate for the occasion. Wrap these labels on your favorite brands of liquor bottles. Remember these are the precious moments that your employees will remember for a long time to come, which will create a stronger bond between you.  

4. Don’t Forget To Include Fun And Entertainment
Strip your party of fun and entertainment, perhaps nothing significant will be left. So, don’t pull yourself back from making it entertaining. To that effect, holiday party games are a great way to bring co-workers together so that they can gel properly with each other. However, you have to make sure to include those activities that appeal to everyone because sometimes introverts tend to exclude themselves. So when you start with an icebreaker, even the most reluctant will play. Here are some ideas regarding which games to include:

• Marshmallows into mouth: In this game, player standing at one edge of a table has to shoot five marshmallows in a row towards other player who is standing at the opposite end of the table. The player who catches all the five wins.
• Belly balloon break: Players have to squeeze balloons between their chests while no touching is allowed. The pair with the most balloons wins.
• Catch the lie: In this game ask the players to write two personal facts, and one of them should be a lie. Now ask others to figure out which one they think is the lie. The player with the least number of votes for his/her lie wins.
• Guess the movie: Write several movie names on different pieces of paper and shuffle them up. Pair your players and ask them to pull out any one from the shuffled pieces of paper. Now, one has to enact a scene from that film and the other has to guess the movie. The pair that guesses right most number of times wins.

​5. Organize An Award Ceremony
Since you want to appreciate the performance of your employees, what else would be the great opportunity to recognize their good works than an occasion like this? This will motivate those employees whose performance was not satisfactory. You can have your employee to nominate their co-workers for certain types of awards such as performer of the year, most valuable employee, rookie of the year, and so on.

6. Create A Photo Booth
Parties and celebrations like these breed a healthy work culture, so isn’t it amazing to catch these moments in an album. For this, you can set up a photo booth for your party where your employees will have their own Kodak moments. So go ahead and create an awesome backdrop to start with by adding as much light as possible. You can get some props as well for your guests. Also, you can create a hashtag for this party in which all the attendees will post their pictures, which can be viewed by all the members of the group.  
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Author Bio:
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Senior VP of Business Intelligence Development, I have assisted the Fortune 1000 company with expertise in the web as a whole, including ground-zero marketing efforts that benefit both consumer and vendor. I'm a thinker, communicator, marketer, competitor, people person, and all-around busy bee. I'm a relentless networker with several years of real world experience and two college degrees under my belt. He is also contributor on Esprittoday.