Office Superlative Award Ideas

May 3, 2017 9:31 AM

I have recently been tasked with coming up with fun, different superlative awards for my fellow nurse coworkers to be distributed during Nurse's week (next week).

I've got some ideas of different categories, but I'm trying to come up with more creative ideas, and different, more fun creative names for them. I figured the hive mind would be the place to go for help! I have to come up with 21 of these at least.
(I.e - "Betty Crocker" Award for best office treats etc? ...Clearly I struggle with this)

posted by Quincy to Grab Bag (12 answers total)

It might help if you gave us some 'generic' names for awards you've come up with, and we can help creatify them. Are you in a hospital, a senior care home, hospice, etc?

I don't know a lot about the workplace of nurses, so I don't know if 'cleanest urinal' is a good award or not. If it is, they should get the Ti-dee-bowl award.
posted by hydra77 at 10:08 AM on May 3, 2017 [1 favorite]

Yes, can you post the names of some of the categories?
posted by stillmoving at 10:10 AM on May 3, 2017

Response by poster: Oh yeah, of course!

Best attitude
Fastest
Most thorough documenter
Most patient
Funniest
Most likely to let an expletive fly
Most likely to help out in a pinch
Most versatile
Most enthusiastic
Best at blood draws

I'm working on some more....
posted by Quincy at 10:32 AM on May 3, 2017

Response by poster: Also, we all work in a practice setting, dermatology specifically
posted by Quincy at 11:15 AM on May 3, 2017

Most thorough documenter = Charts Dickens
Most likely to let an expletive fly = Curse Nurse
Best at blood draws = Vampire (Queen/King) / Count Dracula Award
posted by snorkmaiden at 11:20 AM on May 3, 2017 [6 favorites]

Unit Glue - keeping the milieu cohesive and strong
Scrub Fashionista - best scrubs
posted by Dressed to Kill at 11:28 AM on May 3, 2017 [1 favorite]

I might look up some famous nurses, and then (if you can use visual aids) maybe use the name but something about themselves OR their picture. So like we all know who Florence Nightingale was but if you look at a photo of her, she always looks half asleep. So the Florence Nightingale Dormouse award for best catnapper or something. Margaret Sanger award for patient advocacy. Clara Barton award for strength under pressure. Dorthea Dix award for empathetic treatment of patients. Mary Mahoney award for diversity and inclusion.
posted by jessamyn at 11:57 AM on May 3, 2017 [1 favorite]

For many of them you could use the formula "Charty McChartface Award for Best Charter" (Sticky McStickface for best blood draws, etc.)

For most versatile, you can say the "Elasti-Girl Award goes to Mary Sue for her flexibility." I suppose you can use your judgment on whether a potential male recipient would be amused or not by the name.
posted by Liesl at 12:17 PM on May 3, 2017

For what it's worth, I'm going through this exact same exercise in my office right now. We started down the same path you did - coming up with the superlatives, thinking about who to assign them to, etc. - before changing course.

Now we're put the question out to everyone: What superlative would you assign to your colleagues? Totally fine if any given employee doesn't have a suggestion for one of their colleagues, or has three suggestions for one single colleague. We'll end up with a number to choose from for everyone one of our team members, and the ideas people are coming up with a significantly better than what our planning group had thought up.
posted by NotMyselfRightNow at 12:46 PM on May 3, 2017 [1 favorite]

I've done this kind of thing with my students. Don't try to make a list of 21 awards first and then match people up. You've got a good start with some categories so begin assigning awards to each person at this point - who gets which one - and use pencil. It will become clear to you that some people just don't fit any generic award, and so you will have to come up with an award designed just for that person: "Hmmm, NoraCharles doesn't fit any of those, what is great about Nora? Oh I know she's great at solving mysteries around the office! Super Sleuth award!"
posted by NoraCharles at 1:26 PM on May 3, 2017 [2 favorites]

The most meaningful award I ever got from my co-workers was a giant gold star made with yellow and brown markers and labeled "For Valor in Enteric Isolation."

Note that they made the card. They did not come in and help me clean up the 2-year-old who had smeared diarrhea all over his crib.
posted by SLC Mom at 4:55 PM on May 3, 2017 [6 favorites]

Agree that it's easiest to decide the awards based on the people and work backwards to coming up with cute names. I used to help our office manager come up with the office awards and that's how we did it. We tried to incorporate people's personalities and interests (there was a golf theme for the guy who loved to golf, something superhero-related for the guy who was Marvel-obsessed, etc.).
posted by radioamy at 11:07 AM on May 4, 2017