Organizations find it challenging to manage the process of festival gifting due to various reasons:

1. Time Sensitivity: Employees need to get the gifts in time for the festival.

2. Budget Constraints: Budgets are usually tight in most organizations.

3. Need for Personalization: Employees have different preferences.

4. Ensuring Quality and Logistics: Getting the right gift at the right time and right place is always going to be a challenge.


The gift preference of each employee is different depending on their age, gender, marital status, ethnicity, personality and a host of other personal factors. Hence it is a nightmare for the organization to come up with a scalable solution to festival gifting.

Smaller organizations find it difficult to identify, negotiate with vendors and manage the entire process due to the lack of enough volumes that vendors would typically look for.

Larger organizations are faced with the challenge of big numbers and geographical dispersion of their workforce. This is further complicated by the fact that today a significant chunk of employees of most organizations are working from home or from their hometowns which might be in remote areas.

All this puts a lot of pressure on the HR and Admin Teams in most organizations given the amount of visibility and importance festival gifting gets in organizations.

To top it all, even a single lapse gets highlighted and draws considerable flak from the employees. and the management.

Most organizations understand festival gifting is a great way to enhance employee experience and motivation and create emotional bonding with the workforce.

Given its importance for the organizations in the overall scheme of things, it is critical for them to manage as well as possible.

The following a guide to festival gifting for employees with best practices that are simple and easy to implement for organizations:


1. Plan well in Advance

Since the timing of the festival gifting is critical, organizations need to start planning for it well in advance, possibly a few months in advance. They need to get the necessary budgetary approvals in place and start identifying the vendors to partner with, in managing the whole process.

Apart from budgets, other financial implications such as taxation, etc. also need to be taken into consideration.


2. Offer Choice to Employees

One of the biggest challenges faced by organizations is to ensure that the employees feel happy and satisfied with the gifts they receive. The best way for ensuring this is by providing choice to the employees in selecting their gifts.

For example, giving gift vouchers that can be used at multiple retail stores or on online shopping websites can prove to be a much better option than specific items such as home appliances, gadget or beauty/ wellness products. These gift vouchers provide employees with the freedom of choice and help in enhancing their happiness and satisfaction level.


3. Provide Convenience for Employees

There were those times when employees would lug home an appliance of a gadget that they have received as a festival gift. Or even a big box of sweets! Even physical gift cards can be easily lost or misplaced. Organizations need to look at gifting options that ensure the convenience of the employees.  


4. Use an Online Platform

Organizations should consider using an online platform for managing their festival gifting programs. Such platforms provide employee multiple options for gifts within a certain budget range.

Platforms such HiFives provide options of hundreds of gift vouchers of popular brands that can be delivered to the employees electronically, ensuring both freedoms of choice and convenience for employees. Such platforms can be used not only for festival gifting but also for employee rewards and recognition throughout the year.