Top 12 Lunar New Year Ideas to Boost Engagement and Team Connection

Lunar New Year is celebrated by more than a billion people worldwide, in numerous Asian countries and beyond. Yet in many workplaces, especially global or Western-centric organizations, it often passes quietly or is overlooked entirely.

When cultural moments like Lunar New Year celebrations are ignored, employees can feel invisible. And that invisibility carries weight. It affects belonging, engagement, and how seriously people believe inclusion is taken inside the organization.

Inclusive New Year and spring festival celebrations are about more than decorations or symbolism related to Chinese culture, however. They are about recognition, respect, and making people feel seen.

That is why this article shares 12 practical, inclusive, and workplace-appropriate Lunar and Chinese New Year ideas to celebrate the occasion at work, whether your teams are on-site, remote, or frontline.

Why Celebrate Lunar New Year at Work?

Celebrating Lunar New Year at work is a powerful way to demonstrate cultural inclusion, strengthen engagement, and build global belonging.

It shows employees that cultural diversity is recognized, not just acknowledged in policy documents or annual campaigns. When organizations actively mark cultural moments like the Lunar New Year, they send a clear signal that people’s identities matter in everyday work life, which is a cornerstone of effective internal communication.

It also helps global organizations create shared moments across regions and teams. In distributed environments, shared cultural touchpoints build connection across time zones and roles, especially when supported by a mobile-first employee communication app.

Finally, inclusive New Year and other celebrations support employer branding. Organizations that visibly respect multicultural identities tend to perform better in areas like engagement, retention, and advocacy, especially when inclusion is backed by consistent employee experience practices.

12 Ideas to Celebrate Lunar New Year at Work

If you want your Lunar New Year campaign to land well at work, think “participation without pressure.” The goal is to create a shared moment that welcomes employees who celebrate, educates employees who do not, and avoids turning culture into a performance. 

The best activations are simple, repeatable, and easy to access for every worker, including deskless teams. Use the ideas below as building blocks you can tailor to your workforce setup and local norms.

1. Share the Meaning Behind Lunar New Year

Start with education before celebration. 

Explain what Lunar New Year is, which cultures celebrate it, and why the date changes each year. Highlight key symbols such as the zodiac animal, red envelopes, the local or Chinese word for different traditions, and the importance of family reunions. Consider bringing in an outside expert to teach a seminar on related activities, like Chinese calligraphy, a red lantern festival, a virtual cooking class, the giving of red envelopes as gifts, or other traditional Lunar and Chinese new year traditions.

This prevents surface-level celebrations of religious and cultural holidays, and supports a more thoughtful DEI communication approach to Lunar New Year and Chinese New Year celebrations. 

2. Publish a Lunar New Year Message From Leadership

A short message from leadership sharing their good wishes reinforces that inclusion is intentional, not accidental.

Leaders can acknowledge employees who celebrate Lunar New Year and wish prosperity and good fortune for the year ahead. Video messages often feel warmer and more credible than written notes, especially when they are informal.

This is a natural fit for leadership communication, and a platform like Sociabble makes it easy to publish leadership updates using enterprise video and distribute them across channels like mobile, intranet, and Teams.

3. Highlight Employees Who Celebrate Lunar New Year

Employee spotlights are one of the most meaningful ways to celebrate cultural moments with an authentic festive spirit.

Feature short stories from employees who celebrate Lunar New Year, sharing family traditions, red envelope exchanges, favorite foods, or community rituals. Participation should always be opt-in, and employees should control what they share.

This kind of storytelling strengthens belonging and can reinforce your broader employee engagement strategy as you celebrate Chinese New Year and Lunar New Year.

4. Organize a Lunar New Year Lunch or Virtual Food Moment

Food is a universal connector. And Chinese culture and other cultures that celebrate Lunar New Year have incredibly rich culinary traditions, to pair with an authentic dragon dance to ward off bad luck, or a gift exchange to promote good fortune.

On-site teams can host a traditional lucky lunch featuring regional dishes in your shared office space. Remote teams can do a virtual lunch, red lantern construction project, recipe swap, or photo thread of meals and family traditions.

If you want it to feel inclusive, treat it as an invitation, not an obligation, similar to how you would design inclusive hybrid work culture rituals. Pair it with an office spring cleaning or a “red envelope” gift certificate ceremony if you want to put a more practical angle on it. 

5. Launch a “Year of the Zodiac” Fun Fact Series

A Chinese zodiac-themed content series is an easy way to sustain engagement over several days, as you celebrate Chinese New Year at the office. 

Share daily or weekly facts about the Chinese zodiac animal of the lunar year, with light connections to workplace behaviors like collaboration, creativity, or resilience. Keep it playful and optional.

This format works especially well when published through an employee intranet or a centralized platform where content does not get lost in chat threads.

6. Encourage Employees to Share Cultural Traditions

Invite employees to share photos, greetings, or stories from their Lunar New Year celebrations.

Make virtual and in-person participation voluntary, and set clear guardrails for respectful engagement. The goal is peer-to-peer connection, not forced visibility. While they are enriching activities, employees shouldn’t be forced to participate in a gift exchange, attend a concert of traditional Chinese music, or watch a dragon dance performance if they don’t wish to. 

A centralized feed in Sociabble’s platform helps here because it supports employee-generated content in one place instead of scattering it across email and chat, which is perfect for Lunar New Year and Chinese New Year celebrations. 

7. Run a Lunar New Year Quiz or Interactive Game

Interactive content consistently outperforms passive announcements.

Create a short quiz about Chinese New Year celebrations and traditions, zodiac signs, or common myths. Keep it educational rather than competitive so people feel comfortable joining.

This kind of Lunar and Chinese New Year quiz is a smart use of employee engagement ideas that work at scale, especially across distributed teams. 

8. Offer Digital Red Envelopes or Symbolic Rewards

Red envelopes can symbolize wealth, but they also symbolize good fortune, appreciation, and positive beginnings for those who celebrate Chinese and Lunar New Year.

In the workplace, that can translate into small digital rewards to represent abundance, such as recognition points or a thank-you message from a manager. Emphasize the symbolism of bringing good fortune and long life, and warding off bad luck and evil spirits.

If you want this good fortune campaign to drive real connection, pair it with a consistent employee recognition program.

9. Tie the Celebration to Company Values

Connect Lunar New Year themes like renewal, prosperity, and togetherness to your company values.

For example, “new beginnings” can be tied to learning, innovation, cross-team collaboration, or even a simple office “spring cleaning.” This grounds the celebration in everyday culture so it feels like part of the organization, not a one-off post.

It is also a practical way to reinforce company culture through real moments employees can feel as they celebrate Chinese New Year.

10. Support Time Off or Flexible Scheduling

For many employees, Chinese New Year is a family-focused holiday with travel, religious traditions, or community events that include traditional celebration lunar themes. 

Even small flexibility, like swapping shifts or encouraging planned time off, sends a signal of respect and good wishes. Clear communication matters here to avoid awkwardness or perceived unfairness.

This supports a more inclusive approach to employee wellbeing and belonging.

11. Create a Global Calendar of Cultural Moments

Use Lunar New Year as a starting point of recognition for different cultural backgrounds, not a one-time gesture; it should be more meaningful and durable than red lantern decorations and free spring rolls.

Build a shared festive occasion cultural calendar that includes celebrations of good fortune across regions. This helps you move away from performative inclusion and toward consistent, long-term cultural awareness, including but not limited to employees who come from Asian and Chinese communities that mark the New Year with a traditional lunar celebration.

This also improves New Year planning for internal comms teams working on global internal communications, and can play a huge part in giving employees something to look forward to. 

12. Close the Loop With a Thank-You Message

End the celebration intentionally with an inclusive message for all cultural backgrounds and a final team building activity or trivia game that can encourage diversity as well as engagement. 

Thank employees virtually or in-person, for participating, sharing, or simply engaging with the content. Reinforce that inclusion is ongoing, not seasonal.

This is a simple tactic that strengthens trust, and it aligns with best practices for employee communications that feel human rather than transactional.

How Sociabble Helps Teams Celebrate Cultural Moments

Inclusive celebrations only work when communication reaches everyone equally.

Sociabble can help organizations celebrate Chinese and Lunar New Year by distributing content through multiple channels, including:

• Mobile App 
• Intranet
• Microsoft Teams
• Newsletters
• Push Notifications & Alerts 
• Digital Signage

This supports a consistent multi-channel communication approach so desk-based, remote, and frontline employees all receive the same moments.

Sociabble also makes employee participation easier through posting and sharing features that support storytelling without forcing visibility, a key ingredient in sustainable employee advocacy. And built-in reactions and interactive formats help cultural moments become shared experiences rather than passive announcements.

Final Thoughts

Celebrating Lunar New Year at work is not about decoration or trends. It is about recognition, respect, and belonging. Small, thoughtful actions can send a powerful signal to employees who rarely see their culture reflected at work.

When organizations communicate inclusively and consistently, cultural celebrations become moments of connection, not checkboxes. At Sociabble, we’ve already partnered with industry leaders like Coca-Cola CCEP, Primark, and L’Occitane Group to enhance their employee communications, and we’d love to discuss ways we can help your company, too. 

Want to make inclusive communication easier across every cultural moment? Looking for more ideas to connect and engage your workforce? 

Book a free personalized demo to see how Sociabble helps global companies engage, inform, and include the full workforce.