My office always hosts a Secret Santa event every December. Typically, it’s optional, but this year, management suddenly announced a “mandatory participation guideline.” Their stated reason was that “we need to boost morale.”
Translation: everyone must spend money whether they truly want to or not.
The required buy-in was $40. Forty dollars. For a simple game I never signed up for, in an office where over half the team constantly jokes about “living off ramen.”
I politely told my manager that I absolutely did not want to participate. For one, I don’t personally celebrate Christmas, and even if I did, I am certainly not dropping $40 to buy a random coffee mug for a coworker who won’t even answer my emails the rest of the year.
She responded by insisting, “Well, you HAVE to. It’s a core part of our culture initiative now.”
I calmly said no again.
The very next day, I immediately noticed coworkers whispering. Someone had apparently spread the rumor that “I refused to be a team player” and that I had “ruined the gift exchange dynamic” for everyone else. Someone even slid a passive-aggressive note onto my desk that simply said, “Don’t be so Grinchy :)”
I ignored all of it and kept working.
Two days later, HR emailed me, requesting a meeting to “discuss my attitude surrounding holiday engagement.” I honestly thought it had to be a joke.
Nope. When I walked in, they had literally printed screenshots from the internal team chat showing people complaining about “someone refusing to participate” and “killing the holiday spirit.”
HR asked why I wouldn’t join in on “something that fosters positive workplace connection.”
I gave them a straight answer: “Because mandatory fun isn’t actually fun. And because I am not spending $40 I genuinely don’t have on a gift nobody asked for.”
The HR representative blinked at me and then stated, “You should have communicated your financial concerns sooner.”
I corrected her: “I did. I communicated it directly to my manager. She told me it wasn’t optional.”
After a long, uncomfortable pause, the HR rep quietly admitted that participation was optional—it just simply “looks bad” when someone opts out.
I challenged them: “Looks bad to who? The very same people gossiping about me behind my back?”
By the end of the uncomfortable meeting, they completely backtracked, confirmed that employees “absolutely can opt out,” and immediately sent a new message to the whole office clarifying that participation was fully voluntary.
Now, everyone knows I’m the reason the rules were changed.
Some coworkers now avoid me entirely. But others have quietly thanked me privately because they couldn’t afford the buy-in either. My manager hasn’t spoken a single word to me since that day.
And guess what? The Secret Santa still happens, as scheduled.
And the morale? Not boosted in the slightest.
