WAYS TO CELEBRATE HOLI AT WORK

I have already told you about the history of this beautiful festival of colors from India. I hope you have read my previous blogs on the history of Holi and places to visit in India on Holi. If you have not yet, what are you guys waiting for?  As you might have known from my previous blogs, there is Holi fever in our office. Celebrating festivals at work brings out the happier side of employees and builds an amazing bond amongst each other. Playing Holi in the company’s courtyard or on the terrace will bring a lot of joy and fun and will surely lift up the spirits of all the employees.

It is during festivals that all the employees come together like one big happy family to spread love, happiness, and positive vibes all around. A colorful office with decorated cubicles, slightly jazzy clothes, pinned happy Polaroids, and festivities across the whole office floor is surely something your workforce will be looking forward to.

Holi is the most anticipated festival to be celebrated at work, as the color is splashed everywhere. Even though there will be a lot of cleaning involved post-celebrations, this is one festive celebration that should not be skipped. You can’t control the urge to join in on the festivities, so why not embrace it and have some fun? Let your hair down and smear some color on your colleagues and bosses, because you never know when you might get this chance again. Getting ready and bringing your favorite range of colors for a celebration at your workplace is a delight in itself for every employee across the world. This is an ideal celebration, even for a diverse work environment, because people around the globe are obsessed with this festival filled with colors and joy and would love to be a part of the memorable celebrations.

After all, in between your Excel sheets, conference meetings, and work calls, we are helping you learn how to brighten up your workplace and the work atmosphere. So let this colorful fever continue, and let me tell you about ways to celebrate Holi at work.

Make a photo wall

Mark a particular wall inside or outside the office or in the cafeteria with the company name and logo all over it. Employees can be asked to dip their hands in the colors of their choice and leave their hand prints on this wall. Please keep a marker beside this wall for them to write their names beside their handprints to sign it.

You could make a vinyl poster as well, with the company name and logo printed all over it, and keep it next to this wall so that employees can pose in front of it and click happy and colorful pictures with their painted hands and faces.

MEETAHI (SWEET) PARTY

Tell your team members to get Holi-themed sweets for all, either make them or buy them from outside, have a potluck party, and enjoy a variety of sweets from different cultures and traditions. Of course, let the management also call for some sweets for everyone so it does not look like the management is stingy and does not want to spend. But telling the employees to bring a special sweet from their culture is a lot of fun, as diverse cultures have diverse eating habits and diverse food types.

Set the stage

Set a stage for the more creative employees and tell them in advance that there is a stage set up in case someone wants to do some kind of performance to show off their talent for everyone. It could be a dance, a stand-up act, or singing anything. They can take their pick to entertain their friends.

LET’S PLAY WITH RAANG (COLOR)

Keep 2 hours dedicated to the Holi party during working hours, play Bollywood-themed music, and curate some games to play with the whole team. You could also play music in the later hours and let people color each other’s cheeks with gulaal and dance to peppy Bollywood Holi songs. Trust me, there are a lot of songs available to pick from that go with the Holi theme perfectly.

COLOR AWARDS

Each color signifies a specific emotion. Example: Red signifies love, yellow signifies sweetness, pink signifies friendship, orange is the color of fire, and green is calm and peaceful. Nominate employees who specify each trait, and to keep things more interesting, you can keep a bowl and a stack of chips next to it, where the employees can write about their colleagues and put their thoughts in the bowl. These chits can be later read out in front of everyone.

COLORING BOOTH

Since this is a festival of colors, why not have a coloring booth as well? Mixing the festival of colors with art therapy will help you have a colorful team-building exercise and a skill-building exercise. You could also call out the top three paintings and hang them on the photo wall as a memory. Moreover, give back the individual paintings to them, and these paintings can be pinned on their pin board. It will help their desk be colorful and will definitely remind them of the fun events throughout the year.

RANG-TAKSHARI

Songs like Balampichkari, Rang Barse, and Jai Jaishivshankar are all songs from different decades of Bollywood. Play antakshari with these songs as a Holi-themed play; moreover, these songs are fun to sing and can be an excellent team bonding exercise as well.

BURAN A MANO HOLI HAI

Since Holi is a festival of joy and fun, let's get a little competitive and plan some fun office games with colleagues. You can keep the name of this particular game, Taste the Drink. In this game, there are two teams and one participant from each team has to come forward and taste the drink made in the glass and say what it is as soon as possible. Once he names it correctly, the next participant from the same team can come forward to do the same. Whichever team finishes first wins. Now you might wonder, What is the fun in this? Well, you can keep drinks with all types of tastes. Examples: Neem juice, Amla juice, orange juice, coconut water, root beer, etc. This game is a brilliant team-bonding exercise.

HUNT HUNT HUNT

The timeless, most cherished game—Treasure Hunt. Looking for tiny clues running around the office premises and rattling your brains together to solve those clues Goofing up the answers to those clues and starting the whole process again to keep the competition alive can be a part of the colorful Holi celebrations. Making groups and keeping the employees on their toes to look for clues all around the office and doing as mentioned in the clues, be it enacting, eating, dancing, posing for pictures, laughing, or making funny faces, just to win the race, will surely be a nice team bonding game. Also, you will get some great memories in terms of pictures and videos to look at later.

 PROPS TABLE

A white backdrop, colorful cheeks, fancy festive attire, humorous props kept on a table, and an ongoing party with ear-to-ear smiling and laughing employees Could your team ask for anything more than to click pictures and videos and post them on their personal social media handles? This would be the best way to show the world how much fun it is working for your company and how well the company plans events and festivals.

PAINT + MUSIC + CHAIRS = HOURS OF PLEASURE

This is your traditional music char game but with a slight variation. Make a set-up of chairs along with... In front of every chair, keep a white canvas, some paint, and a painting brush. Tell your whole team to move around in a circle while you blast some peppy Bollywood Holi music. As soon as the music stops, they have to grab a chair and start painting on the canvas in front of them. Then you start the music again, and they again start walking in a circle.

The second person, who again sits in the same chair, has to continue painting on the same canvas as the previous colleague. Please remove one chair after every round. The last one sitting and painting wins. Also, in the end, you will get a lot of canvas with funny paintings on it. It is going to be really fun seeing all of them in the end and laughing together.

Sustainable and eco-friendly

Educate your employees on how to be sustainable by celebrating the Holi of 2021 in an eco-friendly manner. Do not forget to bring eco-friendly colors for this festival. You could also educate your teammates on the importance of planting trees and give them a small planter by the end of it to start off their environmentally friendly journey.

You could also enlighten them about the benefits of eating healthy and choosing a vegan lifestyle. I hope these innovative ideas for team bonding games will brighten up the celebrations of this joyous and colorful festival.