It’s Christmas shopping time again and that means that once again, my wife’s planning has paid off and she has everyone’s gifts dialed in and lined up by the end of October. And for another year, I’m vowing not to procrastinate and wait until the week of Christmas to purchase the few gifts that I’m responsible for each year. We’ll see how that works out for me.
That said, I do feel an obligation each year to buy a gift for my direct reports at work. It’s part of our culture and something I enjoy doing, despite my procrastination making it seem otherwise. Maybe I should work on that, but I digress. This year, we’ve had a pretty incredible year with this team and I want to reward them. Yes, it’s on the company dime because there’s a gift budget, so don’t look at me like the world’s greatest boss or anything….but the team deserves something special.
We frequently go through different third parties to source corporate gifts, but the nation’s supply chain issues have hit these companies hard. Try getting something as simple as company logo t-shirts and see what the lead time looks like these days. Our company has a history of buying Rolex watches for high performers and, while that’s a little bit outside our budget this year, I do love the idea of gifting a watch that someone can wear as a tribute to their accomplishments and keep for the rest of their life. So I went on a search with a few goals in mind. I wanted something in our budget with elegant styling and, preferably, from a company with sustainable corporate practices. I found a couple watches I liked, but they didn’t check the right boxes. Then I stumbled across watches from nordgreen, a Danish company that makes beautiful watches with a carbon-neutral footprint and sustainable packaging.
I found several watches for the ladies on my team as well as a ‘watch builder’ feature where I could customize watches for my team, if I were so inclined. I know that I have a couple members on my team who are, let’s say ‘particular,’ about their style, and the ability to customize bands and faces makes it easy for me to add a personal touch to show that I actually put thought into gifts this year. Instead of just buying them all a bottle of wine, they get something picked out just for them.
I’m pretty pumped about it. Might have to get my wife one while I’m at it…just have to remember not to put that one on the corporate credit card.
