Don’t be rude: Use the celebration cake judiciously

It’s LeadingCompany’s first birthday today.

We are all very excited to have reached such an important milestone, and our small team is going to celebrate over lunch. We’ll look at all we have achieved, at the hard bits too, at the stuff that is going well and what we want to change. And we’ll talk about holidays and life and travel.

Celebrating milestones in any business is so important; that is why you should never succumb to the temptation of celebrating everyone’s birthday with a cake.

Birthdays are not a business achievement. In any decent-sized office, you can end up with at least one birthday cake a week, or more. Soon, everyone starts to groan or avoid these events, and the time they take. And that means there is no time or motivation left to celebrate kicking a big goal, the kind of celebration that sustains the energy we all need to aim for the next milestone.

Sure, everyone gets wished a happy birthday on their special day – and if you are a leader, you should know when each of your team is celebrating – but save the cakes, the lunches, the barbecues and the speeches for the day the company wins an important customer, or launches a new product.