Working Remotely? Here’s How to Celebrate Work Anniversaries Virtually

With more and more teams becoming remote-first, keeping up with work anniversaries and celebrations has become increasingly challenging. This begs the question, how do you celebrate work anniversary virtually?

Below, we created a list of the best and easiest ways to celebrate work anniversaries remotely. 

Why Are Remote Work Celebrations Important?

Recognizing an employee’s achievements and milestones is as essential as ever. A recent Forbes article revealed that companies with a culture of recognition far outperform their competitors. Employees who are consistently recognized are also more likely to stay with a company, showing an increase in employee loyalty. 

If you want to save a pretty penny on hiring and onboarding costs, it’s a good idea to offer employees perks and benefits that they actually want. 

Celebrating work anniversaries, and even remote work anniversaries, is a great way to boost employee morale and retain top talent. 

How To Celebrate Work Anniversary Virtually

A recent study by the York College of Pennsylvania’s Center for Professional Excellence revealed that Millennials feel the need to be recognized more often than any other generation. By celebrating milestones, such as work anniversaries, you can boost morale and inspire a sense of gratitude. You will also convey employee recognition in a fun, light-hearted manner.

Celebrating remote work anniversaries will certainly help your company retain and attract top talent. By retaining your best employees, you’ll also be saving on recruitment costs and onboarding fees, giving you a competitive edge over your competition.

So, here’s a list of fun ideas to help you decide how you want to celebrate a work anniversary virtually.

1. Zoom With Appreciation

Let’s start our list of how to celebrate a work anniversary virtually with probably the most straightforward idea to pull off. 

What you need to do is schedule a meeting with the employee and their coworkers. It would be best if you tried to keep the meeting agenda secret.

Once everyone’s on the Zoom or Google Meet call, explain the occasion and an appreciation circle. 

Give everybody a minute or two to say something thoughtful about the employee being recognized. This peer-to-peer recognition creates a sense of belonging. With an appreciation circle, everybody becomes a part of the celebration.

2. Food and Drinks are Tops

Just because you have a remote team, doesn’t mean you can’t celebrate with food and drinks. 

This idea also ties in well with our first one. Order food and drinks to be delivered to your team’s homes. Alternatively, you can use PerkUp’s team lunch product to manage this for you. If you can, add a cold beverage you can use to raise a toast for the employee of the hour.

Everybody can enjoy a light lunch or snacks while socializing and celebrating the work anniversary. This idea can also be used to add some fun to those boring video meetings.

Ask a manager to prepare a speech, or say a couple of heartfelt words before the celebrations truly kick-off.

3. Game Night?

Another great way to celebrate a work anniversary virtually is by hosting an online game. You could even host the game after a virtual lunch.

Some sites, such as DartConnect, allow players to play games like virtual darts. The best part is that it’s free and can be enjoyed by everyone.

Virtual games are a great way to help employees blow off steam, intermingle and have fun while celebrating significant milestones. Playing a game together is a great way to build team spirit. Remember to do this activity during work hours. A couple extra hours of paid time-off for a celebration will have your people grinning from ear to ear.

4. Take a Virtual Tour

When thinking about how to celebrate a work anniversary virtually, virtual tours are unique and exciting. By including everybody on this virtual tour, you’re giving your team a fun way to interact.

We recommend looking at online sites, such as the San Diego Zoo, the Paris Catacombs, or the Louvre museum. All of these sites offer virtual tours that everybody can enjoy. 

Just be sure to give a quick speech to recognize the employee being celebrated before the tour starts.

5. Remember The Good Times

Our next tip on celebrating a work anniversary virtually is all about nostalgia. There’s no better way to celebrate a remote work anniversary, than by taking a look back at the good times. 

The sense of nostalgia that this  inspires will make employees feel included; as if they belong to a tight-knit family. This idea suits every milestone, whether it’s a first or tenth work anniversary.

To accomplish this, you can create a slideshow of photos, videos, or even quotes from the past year (or years).  Ask the individual’s colleagues to add their thoughts as well. These messages will add a personal touch that will turn the slideshow into a truly heartwarming gesture.

Once you’ve crafted an awesome slideshow, send it out via email to let everybody know how much you appreciate the recognized employee.

6. Go Loud and Proud!

Sometimes, it can be tricky to convey how much you appreciate an employee, especially when working remotely. So, our next idea for celebrating a work anniversary virtually, takes it one step further — and louder!

If you want to do something out of the ordinary, we suggest that you interview your star employee. Ask them about their passions and experiences at your company. 

Now post this interview on the company’s blog or newsletter.

Send a company-wide email informing everybody about the significant milestone. You could also take a few photos and post them to your company’s social media pages.

Not only does this give the employee 15 minutes of fame, but everyone on the outside will see how incredible your company’s culture is.

Your culture of appreciation will not only help your company retain employees, but it will also help attract them! Now, that’s one clever way to celebrate a work anniversary virtually. 

Related: 50 Year Work Anniversary Gifts: Ideas for A Major Milestone

7. Upgrade Their Tech

Your remote teams can’t function without technology. So, to celebrate that critical workaversary, you could always upgrade their tech. 

Don’t worry; you don’t have to buy them the latest, most remarkable piece of technology. Perhaps a new keyboard or mousepad is all they need. Maybe they want a pot plant to decorate their workspace instead. 

Another simple yet effective idea is buying your employee a virtual gift card. 

By giving your people new tech or office decorations, you effectively help make them feel appreciated and looked after. That’s one clever way of killing two birds with one stone.

8. Send a Gift

Just because your team is remote doesn’t mean that you can’t send your employee a happy anniversary gift. In fact, we encourage you to do so. Gifts are still incredibly popular.

As for the contents of the gift, you could put together a hamper full of company swag. Be sure to include a few gag gifts and a card, and have the hamper delivered to the employee’s home.

If you want, you could even make an event out of this and ask the employee to open the hamper during a special Zoom meeting.

Let everybody share their laughter as your star employee explores the variety of gifts in the hamper. Everybody loves getting gifts, so this is always a great idea.

Alternatively you could elect for a virtual gift that the employee can choose. Whereas some people love surprises, others prefer to be empowered with choice. 

9. Old School is Cool

In this digital age, everything is done through email, Slack, or Zoom. To add a personal touch to the work anniversary, why not send a hand-written note? 

A hand-written letter of thanks and gratitude may be old-fashioned, but your employee will appreciate it for years to come, especially if it’s full of messages from their colleagues.

If you want to up the ante, use a poster board instead! Write your sentiment and then send it off to someone else and have them write their own message of appreciation. 

Keep going until you’ve gathered a poster full of hand-written notes. Once you’re happy with the poster, send it to the recognized employee. This thoughtful, old-school gift will have them feel appreciated in no time at all. 

10. Say it with a Song

Do you remember those old singagrams? Well, if you have a creative, fun-loving team, this virtual celebration will be perfect for you. 

Write a song or poem to show your appreciation. Add some humor to it, but be sure that the message is clear - you appreciate your star employee and acknowledge their contributions.

Now, secretly gather the team around and practice the song. Add some background music for extra effect. If those who will be performing can dress up for the occasion, even better! Once you’ve mastered the song or the poem, call the recipient via Zoom or Google Meet, and surprise them.

This creative, out-of-the-box work anniversary celebration is sure to be a hit. For some added social zing, record the song (and the reactions)! 

Post this to your social media pages and give the world a glimpse of your awesome company culture. Who knows, you could even become a TikTok or Instagram sensation, and then prospective employees will be breaking down the doors looking to get hired.

11. Learn Together

People are always looking for learning and development opportunities. So, our final idea is for the team to learn something new together.

Learning something new, as a team, is a great way to boost morale and presents an opportunity for much-needed team building, all while celebrating a work anniversary.

Some easy-to-access online class ideas with mass appeal are virtual cooking classes. Other groups might prefer trying to master a new language. Ever wanted to learn Klingon on company time? Now’s your opportunity.

Employees love gaining new skills, especially if the company assists them in mastering a skill that they’ve been wanting to learn. 

It’s best not to book these classes after work. Otherwise, they may come across as mandatory, and that’ll kill all the fun.

Just because we’re all working from home doesn’t mean that we can’t have fun and celebrate essential work milestones together.

Final Thoughts

When asking “how to celebrate a work anniversary virtually,” the options are endless. Both companies and employees benefit from celebrating work anniversaries. Employees feel appreciated, and companies manage to retain their people. 

Celebrating a work anniversary remotely isn’t impossible. It only requires that you be more creative and flexible in how you celebrate the occasion. So, you don’t have to ask how you should celebrate a work anniversary virtually, anymore.

It’s still as important to recognize these critical milestones as it always has been. If you’re interested in using a virtual gift platform to celebrate a work anniversary virtually, chat with us.

We are more than happy to help. After all, we’re in the business of making employees happy and companies great. Let’s do it together!