Hardly the spirit of Christmas?

[wowfudge]

A bit of background: office building has two floors and in addition this year the next door building has been rented to house a department, previously spread over several locations, in one place.

Colleague A based on ground floor emails Colleague B on first floor to see if anyone on first floor wants to take part in the Secret Santa she is organising. After discussion including Colleague C it is agreed a whole site Secret Santa will be organised this year and C, who organised for first floor last year, will do the whole thing.

A week later C emails everyone on site. A responds, 'we've already done ours down on the ground floor'. Cue exchange of emails between B, C and A. A then says, 'I forgot we'd already done ours when B emailed me'. But it was A who emailed B! Anyway, okay, whatever - they clearly want to do their own thing. So be it.

Couple of weeks later, I am chatting to a colleague on ground floor about how we had agreed we were going to do Secret Santa together, but it didn't happen this year, which is a shame, and this colleague says, 'I don't want to do Secret Santa with the department in the other building. Why would I want to buy a gift for someone in that dept. who I don't know?' To which I responded, 'Well it's an opportunity to get to know people and do something together instead of us all doing separate things, isn't it?' The reply was, 'Why on earth would I want anything to do with that department? No, I don't want to buy something for one of them'.

AIBU to think that attitude is hardly the spirit of Christmas?

Secret Santa works much better in a team of max 40 or 50 where you actually know everyone.

But if there's no interaction, then you'll never get to know others. I agree, the more people take part, the better it is. As it is, there are 2 Secret Santas going on, each with 15-20 people taking part!

Secret Santa works best when you know someone, but in a situation like this, I would suggest everyone brings a wrapped gift in, put under a tree/on a spare desk and everyon pick something out to open all together.

I'd hope to buy a small vibrator for Doris in accounts who's worked there 40 odd years, and she would turn out to be a right randy cow. Hilarity will ensue and everyone will feel like they've bonded

I think they call that a 'Christmas White Elephant' in the States Coffee.

To me a Secret Santa only really works if you know the people that you're buying for. For a lot of people it's just an extra expense and hassle at Christmas time and having to do it with people you don't know - well frankly I'd be a bit put out as well ( though I wouldn't say it as I know it's tricky to organise these things).

It's a bit like our Christmas do. I'm p/t but I always make an effort, which involves childcare arrangements, to attend. This year we were allocated seats at a table with people I mostly didn't know, most of whom were due to leave today. Really annoyed me as I don't get out much and am flat out when working, so I really wanted to catch up with the people I know in my own team.

Also are you guys busy? - seems like an awful lot of effort going on a non work related thing.

We don't have a Christmas do organised by the company and it's the only thing organised at all. How does it seem like an awful lot of effort? Part of the reason for doing it was because some people and departments had got into buying everyone a gift and it means you just buy one gift and we have a bit of a get together over some mince pies one lunchtime.

DH has done 'Yankee swaps' the last few places he's worked at. It is fun if there's enough people willing to make a show of it and it can be a lot of fun to watch how people behave.