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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To ask what gif you'd like from your boss?

41 replies

hairytaleofnewyork · 11/12/2011 10:37

last year i bought each of my direct staff (there are four) a box of posh biscuits and some posh wine. This year I was thinking vouchers - majestic wine vouchers for two of them and specific vouchers for the other two (For a beauty salon I know they use).

I have a dilemma every year because I dint want to buy crap predictable gifts but really am not sure what they'd actually like.

OP posts:
GreatBallsOfFluff · 11/12/2011 10:42

Gosh, you sound like a lovely boss. I don't think any of the four people I directly work for would get me anything other than maybe a drink at the christmas party. (Although one does occasionally leave a chocolate bar on my desk after lunch when she knows I'm having a stressful day - though that's usually an indication of it getting worse because she's going to give me more work to do Smile )

HoHoOpotomus · 11/12/2011 10:48

Vouchers would be great. We get a weeks pay - yay! No other gift beyond secret Santa!

SantaIsAnAnagramOfSatan · 11/12/2011 10:49

i think vouchers sound great.

BlueCat2010 · 11/12/2011 10:50

This year I'm getting ours a day at a health spa. Xmas Grin

laptopdancer · 11/12/2011 10:57

Wow Shock I have been working over 20 years and have never received a gift from any workplace Ive ever worked in.

Annpan88 · 11/12/2011 11:04

The best gift my boss could give me? To piss off and never come back.

I wish you were my boss. Vouchers are always nice

Original poster
hairytaleofnewyork · 11/12/2011 11:07

They work really hard and because most of our work is grant funded we can't give bonuses/gifts paid by the company due to the rules.

I wouldn't say I'm a lovely boss - I'm probably a PITA most of the time Grin But Xmas is a time for showing appreciation. It's more of a token gesture of my personal appreciation really.

OP posts:
iklboonkey · 11/12/2011 11:13

For my boss to stop arranging pointless sodding meetings to discuss stuff we already know. We've got bloody work to do, mate!

spiderpig8 · 11/12/2011 11:41

vouchers or failing that wine or as a 3rd choice Belgian chocs.

Malificence · 11/12/2011 13:25

I've just received £100 of shopping vouchers from my boss - where I only do two afternoons per week, exactly the same as the full time workers - he is lovely though and very well thought of by everyone. Smile
My other job that I do every morning however, I will get the same as last year, absolutely nothing.

DH got 8 bottles of whisky last year from the contractors he uses, did someone say bribery ?

FabbyChic · 11/12/2011 16:40

Not everybody drinks though I don't regularly, about once a year if that, and I never touch wine, I hate it.

Original poster
hairytaleofnewyork · 11/12/2011 16:48

This is it fabby I wouldn't like to get them something they don't want.

mal I can't afford £400 on colleagues.

OP posts:
ilovesooty · 11/12/2011 16:52

I think the company is awarding a £100 bonus (to soften the fact that for the 3rd year running there won't be a pay rise).

From my immediate boss? I'd ask for nothing but that she continues to be as supportive as she's been all year. She's great and I'm very lucky.

Pandemoniaa · 11/12/2011 16:56

I work for myself so tend to treat myself to cake-fuelled indulgences.

DP manages a not-for-profit organisation which has always given shopping vouchers - usually Tesco since there's a couple of huge superstores locally which stock a wide range of things beyond just food. This means that people can get stuff they really want rather than wine vouchers which can be a bit limiting.

DesperatelySeekingPomBears · 11/12/2011 19:29

The first year I worked for my boss we got a £100 cash bonus and a paid office party.

The second year, they dropped the bonus and said they couldn't host the party for health and safety reasons in case someone got drunk and hurt themselves.

Last year we got the threat of redundancy and paycuts.

I am awaiting this year's surprise with baited breath.

CMOTdibbler · 11/12/2011 19:40

I think beauty salon vouchers, and maybe Waitrose vouchers (unless you know that they like Magestic) would be lovely.

We get a corporate two bottles of wine, no party. My boss doesn't even do a card, though his boss does send a nice card

ScaredyDog · 11/12/2011 20:04

We're having a dreadful time at work - just had to reapply for jobs, terrible unfairness and moving goalposts going on, unions involved, people sacked and demoted, it sucks.

Sometimes I think the best gift I could get would be for them to make my redundancy payout worth taking.

As it is, we'll get a bottle of wine from the boss from his own pocket - doubt we'll get as much as a kind word from senior management, mind.

You sound like a lovely boss btw, I'm sure vouchers will be appreciated.

cherrysodalover · 11/12/2011 20:31

I think a bottle of good wine is sufficient if it is coming out of your pocket- it is just a gesture really.I used to spend about a tenner on each person in my team-about 8 when i was a teacher and it was an expensive time of year( you do it again at the end of the summer term generally) but you do need to acknowledge people as a 'boss' somehow if you earn more than them and they invariably will work equally hard as you.

Original poster
hairytaleofnewyork · 11/12/2011 20:37

I did make sure the company paid for the staff meal.

Am liking waitrose vouchers idea.

I have discovered you can only use majestic ones onpacks of wine.

OP posts:
hiddenhome · 11/12/2011 21:08

I'd like my boss to stop keeping the money that's left to us (all the staff) by grateful relatives.

I'd like her to pay for a Christmas evening out for the staff as they're currently expected to pay for it all themselves - they don't even get one drink Sad

I'd like her to stop giving certain people every Christmas off so that the rest of us have to work the shifts regardless of what we would like to do instead.

KittyFane · 11/12/2011 21:14

hairy I'd really like Waitrose/ John Lewis vouchers from my boss. Do they have stores near to you?

Annpan88 · 11/12/2011 21:21

I was thinking about this thread and talking to a girl at work and (tounge in cheek, because I know what he's like) asked what fabulous things he does for his staff at christmas.

Nothing, not even a drink. We work in a pub. No card or even a 'merry christmas'

PowderMum · 12/12/2011 22:00

I get nothing from my boss, used to get a Christmas Bonus, but that dried up 3 years ago for me. I give my immediate team small presents from Lush or similar, have to cost under £10 each as I can't afford more our of my own pocket and it is just a token of thanks from me.

HoneyandHaycorns · 12/12/2011 23:38

Hmm, interesting thread. I have always bought gifts for my direct reports - usually a good wine or other favoured tipple. :) However, last year several of my reports gave me gifts in return. I hadn't anticipated this and worry that people now feel obliged to buy for me. I don't want them to feel this way, but do want to give them something as a token of my appreciation. How do other people get around this? Confused

Goolash · 12/12/2011 23:47

Very disappointed with this thread, I was expecting to hear about requests for dodgy pictures.

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