Inclusive celebration starts with the principle that cultural holidays shouldn't just be acknowledged—they should be co-created. At our organization, we've moved away from top-down planning and instead built an internal Cultural Calendar Committee composed of employees from diverse backgrounds. This team helps select, plan, and communicate holiday observances throughout the year, ensuring the spotlight doesn't always fall on the most mainstream traditions. It's not about celebrating everything—it's about honoring what matters to someone in the room. A recent initiative that worked especially well was our Lunar New Year celebration, which was intentionally designed not just as a party, but as an invitation to understanding. Rather than defaulting to decorations or food alone, the planning team—led by employees who celebrate the holiday—curated a "Lunar New Year Stories" series. This included short video clips and write-ups from colleagues across East and Southeast Asia, explaining how they celebrate at home, what the holiday symbolizes for them, and how traditions have changed over time. These stories were shared company-wide via Slack and wrapped up with an optional in-person dumpling-making event and a virtual red envelope trivia game. One employee from the Philippines shared how their family blends traditional Chinese elements with Filipino Catholic customs, while another from Vietnam highlighted the difference between Tet and other Lunar New Year festivals. The initiative wasn't flashy—but it was deeply personal, and attendance across both digital and physical events exceeded expectations. It created space not just for visibility, but for voice. According to a Deloitte report on inclusive workplace culture, employees are 3.8 times more likely to feel empowered to do their best work when they believe their culture is understood and respected. Our Lunar New Year approach succeeded because it allowed people to define the holiday on their terms—not just through the lens of HR or marketing. It turned observance into engagement. Inclusion isn't a checklist of holidays. It's a rhythm of listening, co-creation, and celebration that honors complexity and invites curiosity. When you let people share what's meaningful to them—on their terms—you create a workplace where everyone feels seen, not just scheduled.
At Benzel-Busch, we've been in business since the early 1900s when my great-grandfather was a blacksmith in Southern Italy, so we understand that our team's diverse backgrounds are what make us strong. Rather than pick and choose which holidays to celebrate, we implemented a "Cultural Exchange Calendar" where employees can mark their significant dates--whether that's Diwali, Eid, Lunar New Year, or something personal to their family. Here's what actually works: When someone marks their holiday, they get first priority for time off that day (no questions asked), and they're invited to share something about it if they want--maybe bringing in food, putting up a small display in our break room, or just telling their story at our monthly team meeting. Last year, one of our technicians brought in traditional Albanian pastries for his family's celebration day, and it sparked genuine conversations that had nothing to do with selling cars. The key insight from my time on various nonprofit boards is that inclusion isn't about the company deciding what matters--it's about creating space for people to show you what matters to them. We budget for it (around $2,500 annually for food and decorations), track participation (we've had 14 different cultural celebrations shared in the past year), and our employee retention in a notoriously high-turnover industry has noticeably improved since we started this three years ago.
I built my company BIZROK with my wife Lauren after realizing my dad's small business issues weren't just financial--they were scalability problems that kept him from my out-of-town baseball tournaments. That taught me early on: people have lives outside work, and respecting that isn't optional. In our dental practice client work, we implemented what I call "Personal Significance Blocking" during our Practice Operations Support rollout. When we help practices with scheduling systems, we train front desk teams to ask patients (and staff) during intake: "Are there any dates we should avoid for you?" No categories, no probing--just open space. One practice in Atlanta finded three team members observed different faith traditions they'd never mentioned because no one asked. The breakthrough came when we applied this to our quarterly Scale To CEO workshops. Instead of locked dates, we survey registrants first and publish the workshop calendar based on actual conflicts flagged. Last quarter we moved an event two weeks later because five practice owners flagged the same cultural observance--something we'd have steamrolled right over with our "standard" Q2 schedule. Attendance jumped 34% compared to our previous workshop. The key isn't celebration events--it's building respect into your operational systems before conflicts happen. When you train teams on scheduling, hiring, and performance reviews with this mindset, inclusion becomes automatic rather than an HR scramble every December.
In the waste management industry, most of our team works outside--drivers like Robert doing pickups, field operations, dispatch coordination. Traditional office holiday parties or decorations don't reach the people who actually keep our dumpsters rolling across Sierra Vista and Tucson. We give every team member three "no-questions-asked" scheduling priority days per year. They submit them through our dispatch calendar, and we build delivery routes around those dates. One driver requested off for Dia de los Muertos to visit family in Mexico--we had his route covered two weeks in advance, and he came back talking about how no previous employer had ever made that possible. The real win came from our veteran background. Military culture teaches you that mission success depends on respecting what matters to each person on your team. We track these requests like any other operational metric--last quarter, we hit 100% accommodation of submitted dates while maintaining our same-day and next-day delivery commitments to customers. When someone works the holiday another person takes off, we pay time-and-a-half regardless of which holiday it is. Christmas, Hanukkah, Ramadan dates, Diwali--they're all treated identically in our payroll system. Turns out people care a lot more about flexible scheduling and equal pay treatment than they do about generic office celebrations.
At our company, we've learned that the best approach is giving employees agency rather than trying to celebrate everything from the top down. We implemented "Cultural Spotlight Days" in which team members can volunteer to share something meaningful from their own background. It's opt-in, never mandatory. One example that really worked was when one of our animators, Sarah, did a lunch and learn about Diwali. She brought in some traditional sweets, showed us how her family celebrates, and we actually incorporated some of the visual motifs from Diwali into a client project later that month (with her guidance). What made it successful was that it came from her authentic experience, not from HR reading off a script. We also give everyone floating holidays they can use for whatever matters to them personally, whether that's religious observances, cultural events, or just personal milestones.
I celebrate holidays in a more inclusive manner using shared values over religious specifics, aligning with the Charta der Vielfalt. I launched the "Vielfalt Festival" in our company to bridge cultural gaps during the traditional Oktoberfest season, to a global event for everyone to enjoy. We replaced the standard beer-hall with a multicultural food-potluck featuring different types of foods (e.g. Turkish dolma, Polish pierogi), enjoyed with non-alcoholic beverages and shared music through a staff-curated global playlist. The Festival provided a way for team members to break out workplace silos, resulting in a 90% participation rate and an increase in employee pride. We focused on creating an atmosphere based on mutual respect rather than tradition, ensuring that all employees are treated equally and included in the community. This example demonstrates that inclusive leadership creates not only an environment of positive employee morale but an environment of "pure respect", where teams truly appreciate their diverse backgrounds and collaborate across cultures rather than divide them.
I'm Daria Turanska, Founder of FasterDraft (https://www.fasterdraft.com ). At FasterDraft, we celebrate cultural holidays and events by creating opportunities for learning and shared experience rather than assuming everyone celebrates the same traditions. This means highlighting the history or significance of each holiday, encouraging employees to share their perspectives, and offering optional ways to participate so no one feels pressured. The goal is awareness, appreciation, and inclusivity rather than uniform participation. One example of a successful initiative is our "Culture Spotlight Weeks," where each week we feature a different cultural holiday or observance through short presentations, curated resources, and optional team activities. For instance, during Diwali, we shared the history and significance of the festival, offered a cooking demo for those interested, and highlighted stories from employees who celebrate it. Participation was voluntary, but it sparked conversations, cross-cultural curiosity, and greater understanding among team members. This approach has helped foster a sense of belonging and respect, as employees see that their identities and traditions are recognized without imposing any single cultural lens. It strengthens community, encourages empathy, and makes our distributed, global team feel valued and connected.
Event Management, Festival Director, Board President at Celebrity Style Events/Wright's Way Foundation
Answered a month ago
I celebrate cultural holidays and events by leading with listening and collaboration. Inclusivity comes from engaging people who are part of the culture and allowing them to help shape how it's represented, rather than relying on assumptions. One example is my work producing the Columbus Caribbean Festival, where we intentionally highlighted the diversity of Caribbean cultures through food, music, fashion, and storytelling. We partnered directly with Caribbean-owned businesses and cultural leaders to ensure the experience was authentic, educational, and respectful, while still being welcoming to people from all backgrounds. That same approach translates well in the workplace, center lived experiences, provide context, and create space for learning and connection so celebrations feel meaningful, not performative.
I run a psychology clinic in Melbourne with a diverse team, so creating an inclusive environment isn't optional--how we operate and serve our community. Our most successful initiative has been our approach to Reconciliation Week. We acknowledge the Wurundjeri people as traditional custodians of the land we work on, but we go beyond the standard acknowledgment. During Reconciliation Week, we facilitate open discussions about culture in the workplace, provide education on culturally-safe practice for our entire staff (both clinical and administrative teams), and actively support causes focused on Indigenous mental health. What makes this work is that it's not performative--we've embedded cultural awareness into our ongoing operations, not just a one-week event. Our admin assistants, research staff, and psychologists all participate, which creates genuine learning moments rather than top-down directives. We've found that when you create space for honest conversation about culture and make it part of your core values (we call this "Connectedness & Community"), people actually engage rather than just tick boxes. The key is consistency and giving people time during work hours to participate. We don't expect staff to celebrate on their own time--we build it into our paid structure because we recognize that cultural awareness directly impacts how we serve our patients, especially those from diverse backgrounds.
I'll share something that might seem unconventional coming from a personal injury attorney, but it's worked for our firm for years. We host a community Thanksgiving turkey giveaway--most recently on November 25th at 10 AM in Clearwater. It's not tied to any religious observance, but it addresses a universal need: making sure families have food on the table during the holiday season. What makes it successful is that it's entirely about service, not marketing. We don't require sign-ups, forms, or anything that creates barriers. People from every background show up--some of our own staff volunteer alongside community members they've never met. Last year we had employees bring their kids to help distribute turkeys, which turned into an impromptu cultural exchange as families shared their own holiday traditions while picking up food. The initiative grew out of my years with MADD and RID in the 1980s, where I learned that showing up for your community consistently matters more than grand gestures. We've been doing this for years now, and it's become something our team genuinely looks forward to--not because it's mandated, but because feeding 100+ families together creates real connection. No one's excluded, no one's singled out, and everyone eats.
I come from a mixed background myself--Jewish and raised in Miami's melting pot marine community--so I saw early on how diversity just *is* when you're working docks, dive boats, and cruise ships. At our firm, we represent injured workers from literally everywhere: Filipinos, Jamaicans, Hondurans, Indonesians--the maritime workforce is one of the most multicultural environments you'll ever see. One thing we do is flex our case meeting schedules during major religious holidays rather than just the standard American calendar. If someone's observing Ramadan, Diwali, or Orthodox Christmas, we move depositions and internal deadlines without making them ask twice. We learned this the hard way when a key witness who was fasting couldn't give his best testimony at 2 PM in July--now we just plan around it. We also keep our break room stocked based on what our current clients and staff actually eat, not some corporate catering menu. When we had several Indonesian crewmember cases last year, we made sure there were halal options and rice-based snacks available during long mediation days. Small thing, but people remember when you see them.
We're focusing on education and choice rather than obligation. So, celebrating cultural holidays is most effective when it is an opportunity for employees to share and participate, rather than be put on the spot or expected to perform. One thing we did that worked really well was developing a cultural calendar where employees could opt in to share holidays or traditions that were important to them, along with a brief explanation for why it was significant to them. The key was making it voluntary and not assuming or expecting certain things. So, we did it in conjunction with flexible scheduling or other small things like having meals or learning opportunities, rather than celebrations. It made it feel inclusive because it was about understanding, rather than assuming, and it felt like we became a more connected culture as a result.
One thing we did that worked for us was to give employees the opportunity to take the lead in celebrating the holidays, rather than having HR decide what holidays to celebrate. So, we created an opportunity for anyone to suggest an event or share something from their culture, and we would support it from the company side in terms of time and a small budget. What we found was something much more authentic than we could have ever come up with from a top-down perspective. People were able to share their traditions, their food, etc., that many people on the team had never even been exposed to. It was a great way to build connections, and it was a great lesson in the fact that when you want to create inclusion, you give the microphone to the people you're trying to include, rather than trying to guess what you think they want.
My personal experience has taught me that true inclusion come from a foundation. It includes choice, education, and flexibility. To start all inclusive celebrations, I develop a multicultural calendar. Planning ahead during periods of importance, such as Ramadan, Eid, or a national day requires input from employee representatives. I have also worked to provide flexibility in holiday time for employees to take leave when there are significant cultural events. I place a higher value on education than entertainment. I happens by establishing short learning sessions, internally developed stories, and cultural spotlights. Participation is always voluntary. Activities do not consist of food items, and all scheduling takes into consideration fasting and prayer times. One initiative I have seen that created engagement from employees is referred to as "Ramadan and the Cultures of Giving" month, which consisted of guidance, providing quality experiences for an iftar that were inclusive, as well as conducting a charity drive that centres around shared values of compassion and community.
I always value cultural diversity in my company. As a healthcare CEO, I always look forward to celebrating cultural holidays because I know this kind of event strengthens the diversity within our team. I know that this diversity also strengthens how we care for patients and how we work as a team. We invite our employees each year to share which holidays or cultural events are meaningful to them and how they would like those moments to be celebrated. We don't just assume what is appropriate, but we create a space for voluntary participation. We provide flexible scheduling options when possible so they can observe important days in a way that feels respectful to their traditions and cultures. We also created a rotating cultural spotlight program where different team members volunteered to share about a holiday that mattered to them. We did this throughout the year, and everyone was thrilled and excited to share about their cultural events. It also gave their colleagues the chance to learn more about each other's cultures in a more meaningful way. Doing this gave us positive results. It made our team stronger. From a business perspective, inclusivity builds trust and morale and creates a direct impact on performance retention.
Our company's approach to cultural holiday or event celebrations is based on creating a positive and inclusive environment. While cultural calendar event dates typically involve a larger group of employees. Celebrating together, participation is always voluntary. Our floating holiday time off allows employees to celebrate their own religious holidays. Last year, we launched a second successful program titled "Month of Identity and Tradition." As part of our long-standing commitment to creating a positive workplace and community, we have offered employees several opportunities in October to share something special from their culture with colleagues, voluntarily, through potluck lunches, short presentations, music, dance, and other activities. One example was the potluck lunches that included live demonstrations of the cultural dance styles of marinera nortena, tijeras, and huayno, along with visual displays representing both Andean and coastal traditions. This activity had more employee participation rate.
One thing we do is have our employees involved in our event planning. Anyone can help plan events if they want, no matter what their job is, and we seek out diverse perspectives. When it comes to cultural holidays in particular, we always make sure that on our event planning team we have employees who are a part of that culture or participate in those holidays so that they are able to provide their input and ideas, which allows us to remain inclusive and respectful of everyone.
Cultural Awareness Week Giving employees the option to participate and ensuring that no culture is viewed as the default are the first steps in celebrating cultural holidays in an inclusive and respectful manner. Using informative messaging, prioritizing learning over stereotypes, and involving employees in planning are all successful strategies. Employees may volunteer to share traditions, food, music, or history during a "Cultural Awareness Week," which can be held by the company through online seminars. The organization can also provide employees with holiday calendars, flexible time-off alternatives, and social gatherings with specific food requirements. This encourages mutual respect and understanding between individuals from different backgrounds, giving workers a sense of value and respect.
We always make sure to have appropriate guidance or leadership when planning these kinds of events. What you don't want to do is plan such events purely on your own assumptions of the culture or holiday if nobody on the planning team is a part of those. So, instead it helps to seek out guidance, whether internally or from an outside source who is a part of the culture/holiday you're planning an event for.
We're a relatively small and very international team, so we strategize around it. Some celebrate Christmas, some celebrate it at a different time, some don't celebrate it all -- and that is for the big winter celebration. Other holidays are a headache to account for. But we make it work much like time zone differences. We mind the timezone difference and do not ask employees to be on the phone at 2AM, and we try to be flexible when it comes to big holidays. In turn we expect for employees to manage the time and resources responsibly, so we're not extending our trust in vain.