Throwing an employee appreciation event is a great way to recognize workers for their hard work and accomplishments. While some companies may simply acknowledge their employees through email or a sticky note on the office bulletin board, having an actual event is a more memorable experience that takes employees outside of their traditional workplace setting.

Set a Budget

The first step in throwing a successful employee appreciation event is to set a budget. It would be nice to send all of your employees to a lavish 5-star resort for the weekend, but this is probably outside of the budget for most companies. Decide exactly how much you are willing to spend on the event and stick with your budget.

Here are some of the costs associated with throwing an appreciation event:

• Renting a venue
• Food and beverages (most companies hire a caterer for events such as this)
• Employee recognition gifts and awards
• Loss of business from being shut down during the event
• Motivational speaker (if applicable)
• Cleanup
• Microphone and speaker equipment

Planning an Employee Appreciation Event

Once you’ve decided on a budget, you’ll need to start planning the event. Look for a nearby venue that’s large enough to accommodate all of your employees. Ideally, appreciation events should take place in a theater where the speaker can call employees down to the center stage. However, a spacious open hall or banquet may suffice for smaller companies. Call around to several different venues to see how much they charge, whether they are open on the day of your event, what restrictions they have (if any), etc.

Have you chosen a date and time for the employee appreciation event? If not, you should go ahead and do so before getting too involved in other aspects of the planning. Opting to throw the event on a day when your company is closed is preferred since it allows all of your employees to attend and doesn’t interfere with normal business.

Another important step in planning an employee appreciation event is setting up the actual presentation. You obviously don’t want to stand in front of your employees with no clear direction. Go ahead make a short list of the points you want to cover during the event, along with employees whom you wish to reward with a trophy or plaque. Create a basic ‘rough draft’ of your appreciation speech, and then go back and refine it later with word-for-word speeches and other key information.