Every year, local chapters and payroll professionals contribute to the success of National Payroll Week by hosting special events and spreading NPW messages throughout their communities. To reward these efforts, the American Payroll Association holds annual NPW Contests. Your chapter’s celebrations may look a little different in 2020, so we’ve put together some tips and ideas to help plan. Use these ideas for virtual and socially distanced activities to create winning contest entries for each category.
Educational Outreach/Community Service Contest
If your chapter loves to organize community service events, make charitable donations, or teach paycheck basics for Money Matters National Education Day, this is the category for you! Although we can’t be together in-person this year there are still many ways to make a difference this September:
- Consider using GoFundMe to hold an online charity donation drive for your favorite local charity or even using Facebook’s “Support a Nonprofit” online donation functionality to raise money directly on your chapter’s Facebook page!
- Teach virtual Money Matters National Education Day lessons with your chapter’s members from the comfort of your own desk.
- Hold a canned goods food drive challenge with your chapter. Have members drop off non-perishables to a local charity and document the experience with photos to determine the overall impact your chapter had.
Local Government Outreach Chapter Contest
Gaining government support through proclamations during National Payroll Week is an excellent way of promoting the payroll profession. Your proclamation request can be issued either via mail or digitally. To avoid in-person contact, you can ask that the proclamation be mailed to a designated member of your chapter rather than awarded in-person during official local government meetings. In 2019, the Chicago Chapter of the APA won 1st Place by receiving an impressive 46 proclamations! Visit the NPW website for tips to help you get started.
Chapter Promotion Contest
Show members of your chapter how much you appreciate them by gifting them with Team Payroll swag from the NPW Store. Avoid in-person contact by sending members an NPW care package in the mail, because who doesn’t love receiving packages? Remember to select your chapter’s name during the online checkout process. Every dollar from purchases made by your and your members earns your chapter points in this contest category.
Chapter Photo Contest
Capture your virtual NPW celebrations with a creative photo and enter the Chapter Photo Contest! We recommend thinking a little outside the box to capture and create award-winning photos this year:
- Gather your chapter members together virtually using an online video or chat platform, like Zoom. Take a screenshot of your virtual meeting in tile form so we can see every chapter member’s smiling face on in their own webcam square.
- Give your member’s photos NPW flair by asking members to pose with this year’s NPW Artwork Poster, hold signs in their photos that say National Payroll Week or #PayrollWeek, dressed as their favorite Olympic athlete while holding a fake torch, wear matching Team Payroll tshirts, or use a digital background to change their webcam background to an official NPW color of gold, purple, or green. This is the part of the photo process where you can really get creative and have fun!
- Unable to coordinate a virtual photo opportunity? Ask each chapter member to submit a photo with the NPW prompts your chapter prefers. Once you have gathered all your photos, use one of the many free photo collage tools available online, like Fotor, to create a unique photo collage of your chapter’s NPW spirit.
Local Media Outreach Chapter Contest
If spreading the word about NPW in print, online, or on radio airwaves is more your chapter’s passion, this is the contest category for you! Send your story pitches via email and call local reporters to share important news on a variety of topics, such as your chapter’s NPW activities, hot payroll topics like the 2020 Form W-4, or your MMNED efforts. Media outreach involves little to no in-person contact and can result in fantastic publicity for NPW and your chapter. The Washington Metropolitan Area Chapter won first place in 2019 by receiving an on-air shout-out from a local radio station and a special video message from reality TV personality Carson Kressley. Visit the NPW website for tips to get your chapter’s media outreach efforts started.
Online Survey Promotion Contest
Every year, the APA uses the “Getting Paid In America” survey to gauge changing payroll trends. With the help of chapters and members who promote the survey, APA can produce important findings that often make media headlines. Have your chapter members complete the online survey and find creative ways for chapter members to spread the word about the survey. The survey is completely virtual so it can easily be shared on social media, on your company’s intranet, or via email communications to friends and co-workers.
Individual Activity Contest
Payroll professionals can also make an impact by promoting and celebrating National Payroll Week at their workplace. The 2019 winner, David Scorza, CPP, celebrated at ADP with several socially distanced tactics such as social media and email campaigns, certification promotions, certificates of appreciation for payroll team members, and more! To nab first place in this year’s contest, you could also consider hosting a virtual luncheon using a web conferencing tool where you have a special guest speaker present on a payroll topic that pertains to all of your co-workers, with time left-over for NPW related virtual games. Each year at the APA, we create daily games and challenges that can be completed by employees online and use a leaderboard to share points each day before ultimately crowning an NPW Champion on the Friday of NPW.
Who will win NPW Contests in 2020? Prizes include free registration for APA’s Annual Congress, free registration for APA seminars, and free subscriptions to the Payroll Source Online®! Visit the NPW website for more details about each category and comment below if your chapter will be entering this year’s NPW Contests!
