Comment by ok123456
3 hours ago
I always immensely disliked workplace birthday celebrations. I've never really celebrated my own birthday.
If your actual friends or family want to do something, that's fine. But mandatory birthday card signings and having your workplace surprise "decorated" with stuff for a children's birthday party (that gets taken down and reused for the next office birthday) is grim, impersonal, and infantilizing. Nothing at all would be better.
It isn’t about the birthday card. It is about someone with power over you demonstrating through actions that they don’t care about you. As an alternative think of this scenario: I prepared a presentation and arranged for the entire team to attend specifically for a manager above mine who had asked for it. He ghosted the meeting, and asked for a TLDR. Every single person in that meeting felt disrespected personally, and stopped taking the issue that we were meeting about seriously.
Note: If your workplace celebrates birthdays and you don’t want yours celebrated, just ask, they will almost certainly accommodate you.