We Don’t Celebrate Anymore

To begin, here’s what I mean by celebration...gathering in the spirit of joy to share hospitality and the pleasure of being with others.  The intent is to connect with others... to build community.

There was a time when we celebrated minor events in our work life.  Today we seem to celebrate less and less.  Two events have sparked this observation.

First I noticed that people don’t take breaks anymore. In workshops, people have time to take breaks, but today that means running to the phone, laptop, or office.  No longer do people stop, talk to each other, and really break – they simply change activities.  It’s been a while since someone stopped to just talk during a break.

The second event came when I was working with Coca Cola in Vienna.  They had arranged a dinner and celebration after the workshops.   Nearly thirty people were invited.  Only a few came. That’s when I heard someone say “We don’t celebrate anymore.”

The next day several of us talked about this and here’s what we noticed…

• There are too many obligatory meetings that people must attend.

• Matrix organizations have confused people.   Cross functional teams abound, yet the sense of community is gone.  They come together, form a team, do the work, and dissolve.

• People are too urgent.  Business urges, prods, or coerces them into moving faster and faster.  There’s always time to fix it later – as long as something is done.

• They’re just plain tired.  They work longer hours because there are fewer people and they have more things competing for their time.  It feels like an emotional desert.

• Corporate gatherings feel more like funeral than celebrations.  Personally, I have been to some funerals that had more life than corporate parties.

• There’s no laughter…people are very serious.  Laughter seems to be frivolous.

• Lunches are still a good time to come together and celebrate – when people take lunch...which can be rare. Most people eat in 30 minutes or less at their desk!

Organizations want to build high performing teams yet they do little to create the community needed.  In our minds high performance is the goal.  It tells us whether or not we are worthy enough.  “Work smarter and harder, do more, with less…faster” is the corporate mantra.  Everything is focused on how we performed, how we did.  We are a bunch of human doings instead of human beings.

Communities are about relationships and people gathering together to create something together.  They are about gatherings where we come together, get connected and celebrate with each other.

Companies and corporations used to be communities.  Even the words, company and corporation, suggest community.  Company means with bread.  People came together, worked, and shared their bread.  Corporation literally means to come together as a body.  Both are community words.  We need to create community again. 

We’ve lost a part of us when we stopped celebrating.  It’s time to find what we’ve lost.  We need to reclaim hospitality.  We need to choose joy and pleasure.  We need to design our gatherings with intent and passion.   

The choice is ours.  Think about it; Now, let’s celebrate!