Holidays and observances for the year

Goal: every public holiday gets a short note the working day before, and the observances your company marks get a message on the day, all set up once in December and left to run.

Time: about 45 minutes, plus whatever you spend on wording.

You will end up with:

the public holidays for each country you operate in, enrolled from the catalogue to the right regional group;
one campaign of your own, “Observances”, holding a step per date you mark;
a manager note before the observances where managers are asked to do something.

Before you start

You are an Admin.
Groups exist for each region, for example US employees, UK employees, Australia employees, and one for People managers. See Employee Groups.
An email sender exists, or Slack is connected if you want these in Slack.
A list of the observances your company marks. The one below is a starting point; dates that move each year are marked.

From the catalogue to the calendar: add a holidays template, enrol a group, and see each holiday as a campaign.

1. Add the public holidays for each country

In Pyn, open Flows in the left navigation, select Automations, then the arrow next to Create New and Add from Template.
Pick the category that holds the holiday templates and select the one for your largest country, for example 2026 US Holidays. It opens on its calendar.
Read the milestones on the left. Expand one, for example Memorial Day, to see its steps: a note to everyone and, on some holidays, a short note for managers. Untick any holiday you do not observe.
Select Use this. Turn Verify Mode on, search for the regional group (US employees) and select it, then Next and Confirm.
Select Enroll more employees if the same holidays apply to another group; otherwise Close and Exit.
Repeat from step 1 for each other country, enrolling each template to its own regional group.

Each milestone is now a paused campaign on Activity, Campaigns, with its message held as Manual.

2. Edit the wording and release them

Open Activity, select Campaigns, and select a month to open it. Select the first holiday campaign in the sidebar and expand it.
Select its step. On Configure, read the message with Preview for someone in the group. Make the greeting yours: name the office, say whether the office is closed, and who to call if something breaks. Keep it to three or four sentences.
Check Scheduled date: the catalogue sends on the holiday itself. For a “the office is closed on Monday” note, move it to the working day before, at 09:00 in the Recipient Time Zone.
Select the state button, then Automated.
Repeat for each campaign. Most take under a minute once the first is right.

3. Create an Observances campaign

Observances are not days off, so they need a different voice: why the day matters, what the company is doing, where to learn more. Put them in one campaign with a step per date.

On Activity, Campaigns, select Create new. Title it Observances 2027, set the Date to 1 January, pick a colour and an emoji, and select Create.
Under the campaign in the sidebar, select Add Step, then Send Email to Employee.
Set Scheduled date to the first date on your list, at 09:00, in the Recipient Time Zone. Under From, choose the sender. Under To, select Everyone, or the regional group the day applies to.
Write it. For International Women’s Day, for example:

Subject: International Women’s Day

Today is International Women’s Day. This year’s theme is on the IWD site, and our women’s network is hosting a lunch at 12:30 in the Seattle kitchen and on the usual video link. Everyone is welcome.

If you manage a team, make the time easy to take.
Select Preview, then Send a test to yourself. Set the step to Automated.
Add the next date: open the step’s menu, select Duplicate, set the new Scheduled date, keep the recipients, and select Duplicate. Rewrite the subject and body for that day. Repeat down your list.

A starting list, with the dates that are fixed. Dates marked “moves” change each year; check them when you build the campaign.

Date	Observance	Note
1 Jan	New Year’s Day	A public holiday almost everywhere; usually covered by the country templates.
26 Jan	Australia Day	Australia. Some companies offer a swap day; say so.
Feb	Black History Month	US. One note at the start of the month.
moves (Jan/Feb)	Lunar New Year	Worldwide; in the holidays and events celebrated worldwide template.
moves (Feb/Mar)	Ramadan begins	Worldwide; a note to managers about fasting colleagues helps most.
8 Mar	International Women’s Day	Worldwide.
21 Mar	Harmony Day	Australia.
moves (Mar/Apr)	Easter, Passover	In the worldwide template.
25 Apr	Anzac Day	Australia and New Zealand.
May	Asian Pacific American Heritage Month, Jewish American Heritage Month	US.
Jun	Pride Month	Worldwide; a manager note on inclusive language is worth adding.
19 Jun	Juneteenth	US; a public holiday in the US template.
moves (Jul)	NAIDOC Week	Australia.
15 Sep to 15 Oct	Hispanic Heritage Month	US.
Oct	Disability Employment Awareness Month	US; a manager note on adjustments.
11 Oct	National Coming Out Day	US.
moves (Oct/Nov)	Diwali	Worldwide.
Nov	Native American Heritage Month	US.
moves (Nov)	Transgender Awareness Week	US; a manager note.
10 Dec	Human Rights Day	Worldwide.
moves (Dec)	Hanukkah	Worldwide.
26 Dec to 1 Jan	Kwanzaa	US.

4. Add the manager notes

For an observance that asks something of managers, open its step, select the menu, then Duplicate, and set the Scheduled date two working days earlier.
In the copy, change To to People managers and rewrite it as a request. For Ramadan:

Subject: Ramadan starts this week

Some of your team will be fasting from dawn to sunset for the next month. Two things help: ask before booking lunch meetings, and be relaxed about earlier starts and finishes. If someone needs a quiet room for prayer, the booking link is on the intranet.
Set it to Automated.

What you should see

On Activity, Campaigns, the year view shows a coloured date for every holiday campaign and a dot for every step; the Observances 2027 campaign shows one date with dots spread across the year. As each date arrives, the step’s deliveries appear under All Messages as Delivered. Next December, duplicate the Observances campaign with Recalculate Step Dates on and a reference date of 1 January, then fix the dates that move.

Next steps

Duplicate a campaign when next year comes round.
Create a conditional sender so each region’s note comes from its own HR lead.
Add reminders is not available on campaign steps; use a duplicated step on a later date instead.

Add a campaign template and Enroll employees in a campaign for chapter 1 in detail.
Create a campaign for chapter 3 in detail.
Employee Groups for the regional groups.