It is a well-known fact that making personal connections in the workplace leads to increased happiness and raises employee loyalty, but sometimes it’s not so simple when your business is spread all over the globe, with over 56,000 employees in 200 countries.
For the elves at Elfster, connecting communities is what we do best, so imagine our delight when we found one such company using our “Elfin Magic” to connect its greatest asset — its employees — from all over the world.
TNT – The People Network, a global express delivery company, is also in the business of making great connections. The people of TNT make 1,000,000 parcel deliveries around the globe each and every day and are committed to their mission as stated on the company’s website: “Every day, we go to great lengths to connect people and businesses all over the planet.”
As TNT celebrated its 70th anniversary, they wanted to make the occasion something to remember, so the company turned to Elfster to help make these worldwide connections a reality.
“This year, TNT has seen its 70th anniversary. To celebrate, we recently held parties in offices and transport depots and hubs all around the world,” explains Ann Hayes, Elfster gift exchange organizer and TNT Internal Communications Officer based in The Netherlands. “As an express delivery company, our people are our biggest strength. They have made us who we are today – The People Network – so we wanted to make sure that they, more than anyone else, were able to celebrate TNT”s big ‘seven-oh’ birthday.”
“Many of the events were happening either on or around 21 April, so to try and connect our colleagues around the world, we decided to organise a global gift exchange — called People Party Parcels,” she adds. “In the end, we had 170 office/depots participating in the exchange from 50 different countries – from Moldova and Iceland, to Tanzania and Australia. We kept our approach simple: A party location would sign up to Elfster/the exchange, and they would then put together a parcel for another location around the world also participating, and then they would send the parcel via our network.”
So what were the expectations for these special care packages?
“We asked those participating to put together a parcel which would help their colleagues in another country celebrate — containing objects which reflect their people and culture,” Ann says. “For example, our colleagues in Japan sent a Daruma wishing doll to our colleagues in Czech Republic, and Kazakhstan sent TNT head office in The Netherlands a handmade photo collage of all their colleagues in the shape of the TNT logo. I found that those participating really put so much care and effort into the parcels they sent.”
“What I loved about using Elfster was that people around the world were able to chat to each other within the exchange page — colleagues that otherwise may have never connected,” she says. “We had colleagues participating from Siberia, for example, talking to those they sent a parcel to in the UK.”
And check out how perfectly personalized the gifts were in this culturally-focused exchange. “[This] is a photo of a teddy bear our colleagues in Siberia put together for the UK – the scarf, mobile phone and t-shirt were all handmade by the people there (with the help of one of their mum’s!),” Ann shares.
We can think of no better way to celebrate such an amazing milestone for TNT, while including those who make important connections happen for the company on a daily basis.
“I think our colleagues really enjoyed the opportunity to connect with people they otherwise would have never met around the world, getting a taste of all the different people and cultures that have made TNT the company it is today,” Ann says. “It definitely added something special to our 70 years of TNT celebrations.”
“That’s why we make sure our service is truly personal. That’s why we go the extra mile. And that’s why we call ourselves The People Network.” — TNT website
Have a story to share about how your company motivates its employees? We’d love to hear from you, too. Want to connect with the elves at Elfster? You can reach us via Facebook here, Tweet us @elfster or catch us on Instagram @elfster.
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Photo credits: National Geographic Shop, Business Case Studies, Zafiels Cakes
