Celebrations in Slack: turning holidays and milestones into culture
Work isn’t just about tasks and deadlines, but also about connection. In distributed and hybrid workplaces, employees can often feel isolated, missing out on the small but meaningful moments of office culture that naturally bring people together. That’s why celebrating shared events – holidays, milestones, and “just for fun” days, isn’t fluff. It’s a proven way to build belonging, engagement, and a stronger team culture.
Why celebrating together matters
Isolation is the #1 hidden risk in remote work
Research from Buffer’s State of Remote Work shows that over 20% of remote workers cite loneliness as their biggest struggle. Gallup also notes that employees who feel disconnected from their organization are twice as likely to leave within the next year (Gallup).
Shared celebrations counter this isolation by creating moments of togetherness. Even small things, like celebrating Best Friend’s Day, Halloween, or a company anniversary become culture-building events when marked as a group.
Culture is built in the everyday moments
Celebrating only birthdays or end-of-year parties leaves a gap. Teams thrive when there’s a rhythm of shared experiences: a calendar of moments that spark joy, laughter, or reflection. Harvard Business Review points out that employees in “high belonging” cultures experience 56% higher job performance and 50% lower turnover (HBR).
Celebration lets HR teams, managers, and even CEOs establish this rhythm in Slack or other team communication tool, without needing to coordinate manually.
What to celebrate with your team: beyond the obvious
⭕ Milestones that matter: project launches, big wins, sales closures, team anniversaries.
⭕ Global holidays: from U.S. observances to popular worldwide events like Lunar New Year, Diwali, or Holi.
⭕ Culture-building moments: Company anniversary, National Have Fun at Work Day, Random Act of Kindness Day, Earth Day, National Coffee Day, and more.
These celebrations bring your culture to life, making every teammate feel valued, even when they’re miles apart.
BirthdayBot prepared a list of templates for Celebrations: using them, you can build a company-wide calendar of shared events. Examples include:
🇺🇸 US Holidays
🎇 New Year’s Day — Jan 1
💡 Martin Luther King, Jr. Day — 3rd Monday in January
🏛️ Presidents’ Day — 3rd Monday in February
🗓️ Memorial Day — last Monday in May
🖤 Juneteenth — June 19
🗽 Independence Day — July 4
💼 Labor Day — 1st Monday in September
🫂 Indigenous Peoples' Day — 2nd Monday in October
🎖️ Veterans Day — Nov 11
🦃 Thanksgiving — 4th Thursday of November
🎄 Christmas — Dec 25
🌍 World’s Popular Holidays
💝 Valentine’s Day — Feb 14
🌕 Lunar New Year — flexible
🎨 Holi — flexible
☘️ St. Patrick’s Day — Mar 17
🐣 Easter — flexible
🕌 Eid al-Fitr — flexible
🪔 Diwali — flexible
👻 Halloween — Oct 31
🌳 Bodhi Day — flexible
✡️ Hanukkah — flexible
🎉 Company-Level & Culture Days
🎂 Company Anniversary — flexible
🪩 National Have Fun at Work Day — last Friday in Jan
🫶 Random Act of Kindness Day — Feb 17
📣 Employee Appreciation Day — 1st Friday in March
🌎 Earth Day — Apr 22
🚴 National Bike to Work Day — May 16
🤝 Best Friend Day — June 8
💆♀️ International Self-Care Day — July 24
📖 National Book Lovers Day — Aug 9
☕ National Coffee Day — Sep 29
❤️🩹 World Mental Health Day — Oct 10
🏆 Celebrate Your Unique Talent Day — Nov 24
👐 Giving Tuesday — 1st Tuesday in Dec
Together, these events may create your calendar of connection: a predictable rhythm of culture-building that employees can look forward to.
Introducing Custom Celebrations in Slack with BirthdayBot
BirthdayBot’s new Custom Celebrations feature makes it effortless for HRs and leaders to bring this calendar to life:
⭕Celebrate any milestone: from company anniversaries to project completions.
⭕ Recognize local holidays inclusively: preloaded templates for U.S. and global observances.
⭕Engage with fresh ideas: 12 ready-to-use culture templates like Self-Care Day or Coffee Day.
⭕ Make it yours: customize text, visuals, emojis, and channels to fit your culture.
⭕ Automate everything: schedule posts to Slack, even for floating holidays, add single-time or recurring events, tag employees, so no moment is missed!
👉 Find it in BirthdayBot Home → Events and Team Milestones → Custom Celebrations.
What is the ROI of a team celebration app in Slack?
For HRs, People leaders, and managers, Custom Celebrations is more than a feature, it’s a culture amplifier.
Frequent recognition boosts motivation and productivity
Adding personal or team achievements, promotions, successful project completion, and other events to your Company’s Calendar may have a huge impact on the employees’ wellbeing.
NectarHR says that a staggering 77.9% of employees say they'd be more productive if recognized more often, while 81.9% say recognition for their contributions improves engagement. Prioritizing recognition can increase productivity by 21%, and employees recognized at least monthly are twice as likely to feel productive according to Achievers.
Recognition helps retain top talent
Effective recognition lowers voluntary turnover by 31%. When recognition is meaningful, employees are 45% less likely to leave.
The science behind timely and diverse recognition
Regular, meaningful recognition dramatically builds belonging: employees recognized weekly are nine times more likely to feel they belong and six times more likely to envision a long-term career.
For Gen Z and Millennials especially, 73% want regular recognition
Moreover, engagement is helpful for the following:
⭕ Prevents isolation: especially critical in distributed teams where nice heartfelt moments don’t happen naturally.
⭕ Builds inclusivity: acknowledging diverse cultural and global holidays makes everyone feel represented and valued.
⭕ Creates consistency: automated announcements ensure no holiday or milestone slips through the cracks.
⭕ Strengthens engagement: employees who feel connected to culture are 3.7× more likely to be engaged (Gallup).
⭕ Signals leadership care: when leaders sponsor celebrations, employees feel the company is invested in their well-being.
How to use it
1️⃣ Pick your core calendar
Start with the U.S. list, add global holidays, then sprinkle in company culture days (such as Coffee Day, Anniversary, and Fun at Work Day). Consider local holidays for teams outseas or celebrate world’s most popular holidays in distributed teams.
2️⃣ Customize your voice
BirthdayBot provides mild-style ready-to-use templates. Edit templates with your company’s style, whether professional, playful, or quirky. Add custom branded images if you wish. Feel free to use this feature to announce Pizza Fridays, promotions, project completions, etc.
3️⃣ Automate scheduling
BirthdayBot handles time zones, floating holidays for the USA, and recurring events. So scheduling becomes easy and fun!
4️⃣ Iterate with feedback
Watch engagement (emoji reactions, comments), then fine-tune your calendar.
Final word: belonging through shared moments
Research is clear: recognition isn't a bonus, it's baseline. Teams with consistent, meaningful acknowledgment stay longer, perform better, and feel closer. For remote and hybrid cohorts, embedded celebration tools are essential in keeping connection alive.
Custom Celebrations in BirthdayBot gives HRs, CEOs of smaller companies, department managers, and team leaders the tools to design it: an automated, inclusive, and joyful rhythm of holidays, milestones, and cultural touchpoints right in Slack. With Custom Celebrations, employers get the best of both worlds: human warmth, operational ease. Every click, every post, becomes an opportunity to say, “We see you. You’re part of something.” And nothing beats that (even the jet2 holiday).