Traditions and rituals are great ways to add some fun and passion into the workplace on a consistent basis.

They can be used to inject some energy and life into the workplace.  Traditions help create a sense of shared history and team cohesiveness. They can help cement your workplace’s identity and even your brand. Traditions and rituals also give employees something to look forward to and something to reminisce about, which, according to happiness experts, are two things that can substantially boost happiness levels. Traditions also can help give employees a chance to flex not only their funny bones, but their creative muscles as well.

There’s one more reason to start a few great traditions in your workplace, and that’s simply that fact that traditions can quickly become habits. There’s nothing worse than starting a new initiative at work and having it fizzle out after only three weeks.  Creating some traditions, on the other hand, help ensure some practices stick around for a long time.

Some of the best traditions are those that come about organically and spontaneously, like the “Golden Banana Award” that a Hewlett-Packard office started after a senior engineer once handed an employee the only thing he could find quickly to thank him for his hard work: a banana!

Similarly, my own speaking association has its annual “Passing of the Banana” ceremony wherein all the former past presidents pass a banana down the line to the new incoming president. The tradition began the first year of the association when the only object that could be found to honor and “knight” the incoming president  was a banana.  (Of course, not all traditions involve bananas. I’ve heard of some fabulous traditions involving oranges as well.)

But traditions can also be planned for and can also help your workplace achieve other goals at the same time. Rituals that celebrate certain milestones, for example, can not only become deeply entrenched parts of your organizations’ DNA,  they also help ensure you stay committed to appreciating and thanking employees.  Rituals that help you jump start your meetings also help ensure meeting participants show up on time and can help set the mood for a more open, relaxed and creative meeting.  So look for traditions that can help you achieve another goal, but also look for opportunities to create rituals that are simply fun.

Here are just a few opportunities you might want to consider for  creating a fun, creative ritual or tradition around in your workplace:

Start of the week tradition: Something that jump starts people’s attitudes or reminds them of the biggest priority of the week.

End of the week tradition: Something that could celebrate your team’s top successes.

A different tradition for each day of the week.  For example: Fun Dance Mondays, Tacky ties Tuesday, High Five Wednesdays, Third Person Thursdays (where everyone refers to themselves in the 3rd person), Fun Food Fridays.

Start of the morning ritual.

End of the day ritual.

A ritual to kick off each quarter.

A tradition to celebrate the end of fiscal year.

Traditions around welcoming new employees and making them feel part of the team.

A start of the summer season tradition.

A ritual that kicks off every meeting and/or ends every meeting.

A ritual that every meeting participant must adhere to before making a presentation at a meeting.

Traditions around celebrating employees’ birthdays

A tradition that celebrates the founding date of your company.

A tradition that celebrates every big sale over a certain amount.

A tradition that celebrates each time your organization takes on a new major client.

A tradition that celebrates a certain monetary milestone or number of customers.

A tradition that celebrates milestones of accident-free workdays.

A ritual that celebrates some of the offbeat holidays, such as “International Talk Like a Pirate Day”.

A “We’re half way through ___________” ritual to celebrate the midway point of a massive project.

Appreciation rituals that encourage people to take responsibility for thanking each other on a regular basis.

Rituals that celebrate “smart failures” and setbacks in fun ways.

If you have a tradition or ritual in your workplace, we’d love to hear about it.  Drop us a line at mike@mikekerr.com

Copyright Michael Kerr,  2011, www.MikeKerr.com. Michael Kerr is a Hall of Fame international business speaker, trainer and very funny motivational keynote speaker. He is the author of 8 books, including, The Humor Advantage: Why Some Businesses Are Laughing All the Way to the Bank, The Jerk-Free Workplace, and Hire, Inspire, and Fuel Their Fire.