South Yorkshire-based printing organisation Instantprint boosted employee engagement through launching a virtual workplace dress contest for its 43 employees.
The traditional fancy dress competition took place online this year due to the constraints of the Covid-19 (Coronavirus) pandemic. The contest set out to improve employee relationships and drive the organisations' people strategy.
Instantprint encouraged employees to put together their best Halloween outfits for a chance to claim the title 'Instaprint's Halloween Champions 2020'. Through this contest, the employer saw a 20% increase in engagement and happiness, as well as seeing an increase in team communication.
During the pandemic, Instaprint has been working on a number of ways to keep their employees engaged and productive. The organisation has been encouraging employees to embrace technology by offering in-house digital training and it has also set up a a recognition programme which allows employees to nominate team members as either brand heroes or value champions. Its regular employee one-to-ones have remained in place and departmental email are sent around to keep employees up-to-date on any important updates or business developments.
Vicki Russel, head of team experience at Instantprint, said: " Like many organisations, we run a series of seasonal events so our team can bond outside of working hours. While our full office teams are working from home during the Coronavirus pandemic, we have been keen to maintain this same level of commitment, especially since it can be more difficult to feel engaged and connected during lockdown.
"Events like this present a multitude of benefits for employees and, ultimately, the organisation as a whole. As well as engagement, it keeps our strong team culture alive while we are away from the office and offers a sense of togetherness, which has never been more important than it is right now.”
