How to refocus and relax during the silly season

Article by Sinead Clarke Marketing Specialist 24 November 2022

The end-of-year period is always a source of excitement for many Property Managers, with the joy of Christmas being ever-present and the busyness of EOFY a distant memory. The ‘silly season’ as it’s affectionately called, can be the perfect time to recharge morale and allow your team to get a well-deserved break before the beginning of 2023. While it may seem obvious that the end of the year brings excitement and relaxation in spades, it can sometimes be seen as a time to blow out, which can only make your team more exhausted and lower morale in the long run. While we implore you to celebrate the year that’s been and enjoy a few bevvies with your team, we also encourage you to utilise this time to recenter, refocus, and re-energize.

With that being said, we encourage you to take a look at our top tips to best utilise the silly season in your office.

1. Involve the whole office in Christmas decorating festivities

Yes, it may sound dorky but decking the office out in Christmas decorations is a surefire way to signify that it’s the end of the year and boost excitement levels. In a lifestyle article, Dr Sally Augustin revealed that Christmas decorations are scientifically proven to boost your mood, as our primal instinct dictates that there is a direct correlation between sight and mood.

Furthermore, involving your team in the decorating (even if they’re reluctant at first) is a great way to facilitate a team-building activity and allows everyone to feel as if their ideas are valued and they’re contributing to the space. You know what they say, many hands make for light work!

2. Surprise your team with a half-day

If you’ve got the means to do so, we highly recommend rewarding your team for their hard work with a half-day at some stage over the Christmas period. Time off is the perfect way to boost employee morale and promote rest and relaxation, as you’re signifying to your team that you respect their time and energy. It was reported by Forbes that time away from work improves mindfulness and heart health, reduces stress, increases brainpower, and improves sleep. Now that’s a lot of benefits from a few hours of downtime!

While we know it can be difficult with staffing requirements to allow the whole team to knock off at lunchtime, there are other ways to facilitate this. The most common is to let your employees know ahead of time and allow them to stagger their half days over the course of a few weeks. Happy time off, you deserve it!

3. Plan a Christmas party for your team

This tip is rather self-explanatory as it’s common practice to throw a Christmas party for your team. However, with increased workloads and pressure surrounding the party, it can often become an afterthought that results in a low-effort and low-impact gathering. In saying this, you don’t need to blow the budget to throw a good party, instead taking some time to understand what your team needs is vital. Need to blow off some steam? Take the team go-karting or axe throwing. Need to let loose and have some fun? Take the team to karaoke or a silent disco. For more Christmas party ideas click here.

4. Engage in volunteer work

The holiday period can be particularly difficult for those in need, with this time of year echoing their hardships louder than before. Unfortunately, for the majority of us volunteering is something that falls by the wayside during the holiday period as we’re swept up in the busyness of Christmas shopping and catching up with loved ones. However, volunteering is a great way to take a breather and step into the holiday season with a sense of accomplishment and gratitude. Volunteering as a team also allows your colleagues to work together, and walk away feeling a sense of team comradery. The Salvation Army and Cancer Council both offer corporate volunteering opportunities, but it’s also worthwhile getting in contact with your local council or rotary club to understand where you can make a difference.

5. Facilitate a recognition Secret Santa

We know this one sounds cheesy, however, we encourage you to give it a chance. There’s no doubt that you’re familiar with the concept of Secret Santa, whereby you set a price range, draw a name from a hat, and purchase the selected person a gift. However, it can get tricky when you’re purchasing a gift for a colleague that you don’t know well. With whisky drinkers being gifted bottles of wine, and lactose-intolerant team members being gifted chocolate, it can become a slippery slope to navigate. 

Instead, a recognition Secret Santa allows for the same festivities of giving, however, reduces stress and a mismatch in gifting. Recognition is a top motivator for workers with 67% stating that they see it as a better motivator than monetary reward. So how does a recognition Secret Santa work? In keeping with the theme, everyone in the team draws a name and submits their words of recognition anonymously, then on the day of the Secret Santa, everyone is sent their anonymous words of recognition via email.

6. Take the time to discuss your team’s goals for the upcoming year

With team members taking time off over the Christmas period and the office closing periodically, it’s imperative to sit down with the team and review the year that was, as well as set goals for the next six months. The end-of-year period is a time for slowing down and reflecting, however, it’s not often that we actually write these reflections down or verbalise them. 

We recommend setting aside an hour or so (depending on your team’s size) to sit down and discuss everyone’s individual and united work goals. You could even go a step further and send the team some useful questions and pointers to consider or take notes on before the meeting to ensure that everyone gets the most out of the session.

So there you have it, our top six tips to refocus and relax during the silly season! Let us know your thoughts by emailing [email protected]