Can You Motivate Employees Using Halloween at Work?

It’s time to remove the cobwebs from your employee engagement strategies as the spookiest time of year approaches.

Halloween can be seen as being full of mischief, haunted houses, and candy. But what about in the office? If you’ve ever been involved in an office Halloween party or other celebration, you know it can either be really fun or a bust.

Well if you think about it a little more strategically, Halloween can be a great way to increase employee engagement and satisfaction and motivate your employees. And looking at the numbers now, you might want to be thinking about it.

Disengaged Workers Negatively Effect Employee Motivation

According to this infographic, disengaged employees cost American employers a whopping $350 billion per year in lost productivity. And trends are showing that employee engagement is still falling, with 24 percent of a survey’s respondents saying their employees are less engaged versus 13 percent in 2010.

So we all know offering career development, showing recognition for a job well done, and encouraging trust in the office are three perfect ways to increase employee engagement. But with Halloween knocking on our door, are there ways to get employees involved and motivated in this haunting Halloween affair?

Yes — and here are 4 relationship-building events to do that:

1. Invite your employees to bring their children to a trick-or-treat day in the office.
Everyone loves showing off their kids, so why not include them in some festivities at work? Allow them to go from door to door (or cubicle to cubicle) to treat-or-treat. It’s a great way to get to know your staff’s #1 priority — their family.

2. Don’t want the kids in your office? Sponsor a Trunk-or-Treat evening instead.
If you don’t feel comfortable having kids running around your office but still want to include them in Halloween fun, hold a Trunk-or-Treat event in your building’s parking lot. If you’ve never heard of Trunk-or-Treat, it’s basically trick-or-treating out of the trunk of your car. Each employee or department will have their car in the parking lot handing out candy to families passing by. If you’re community does a local Trunk-or-Treat, consider signing your company up to be involved. This will increase employee engagement and community activism.

3. Sponsor an office pumpkin carving contest.
This event can be done with or without the kids, depending on your preferences. But add some twists to the event with your employees. Make office-related themes for the carvers to choose from in their carving endeavors or consider giving the winner a gift card to your local coffee shop or let them leave work 30-minutes early one day.

4. Office decoration contest.
Create a Halloween decoration contest between each department in the office. This team-building activity can tell you a lot about each team while increasing creativity in the workplace.

Disengaged Employees Are Not Happy.  They Are Expensive.

Whatever you choose to do this Halloween, keep your employees morale and happiness in mind. What would they like to do for Halloween? Bringing Halloween to the office is a great way to celebrate the season and have a little fun while doing it.  Managers need to focus on ways to involve, engage, and relate to their employee population.  If they do not, they run the risk of fostering a disengaged and unproductive instead of happy and active office of employees.

What is your office doing for Halloween this year?