Sehrish Irum Mark the Holidays that Matter to Your Organization

Fifteen years after the end of the cold war, in his State of the Union speech, President George W. Bush brought our nation’s attention to a new threat. Gay marriage. As the president shared in his address, our nation is built on the foundation of marriage. It is one of the most fundamental and enduring institutions of our civilization. The sanctity of marriage had to be protected our whole civilization would fall.

In the audience at the president’s address was Gavin Newsom, then the Mayor of San Francisco, who was attending as a guest of Rep. Nancy Pelosi. He heard the news about this threat to our nation. Did he shriek in fear? Begin to sob in concern for his friends and family and the pending Gay Dawn?

No. He laughed and decided to call the president’s bluff.

On June 19, Steve Van Landingham and Taproot’s Matt O’Grady were among the first to get married. They had been together for fifteen years. They shared their lives and even after so many years were an annoyingly cute and loving couple.

It was a proud day for Matt. He was marrying a man that he loved deeply and he was becoming part of history. His life had been spent battling homophobia and seeing the impact on the people he loved. To help celebrate, he invited the entire San Francisco Taproot team to join him at the rotunda at city hall to share the moment.

Matt’s wedding meant a lot to me as a friend but also as someone deeply committed to civil rights. The team would be given the day off to celebrate his wedding. What Matt didn’t realize right then was that it wasn’t just the San Francisco team, but the entire organization across the country.

But he also didn’t realize that we hadn’t just made June 19, 2008 a day off for the organization. We had named June 19 Matt O’Grady Day and had modified our policies to make it a holiday and day off from work every year going forward.

That was our wedding gift to Matt and Steve. It was also our way to showing our support for the gay community and for every person out there that is denied the right to be a full member of society. It was a manifestation of one of our core organizational values – progress: we believe people, organizations and society must constantly move forward to survive.

To this day, Matt recalls the creation of Matt O’Grady Day as the “single greatest honor” he has received in his professional life. Even after his tenure at Taproot ended, his legacy lives on and is a source of annual inspiration for the team.

As the oldest democratic nation in the world, we have many holidays that were created over the years. Some are meaningful and others have become detached from their roots. As the founder of an organization, you have the opportunity to set your calendar based on your values. I decided not to make President’s Day a holiday but did add Election Day to our calendar so my team could help be active participants in the democratic process.

Find the things that matter to you to celebrate with your team to reinforce your values and to connect to your team as people.

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