Election day is a Paubox holiday

General election day in the United States is the Tuesday after the first Monday in November, in every even numbered year. And since 2020, it's been a Paubox holiday. Today was no different.

In this post, I explain our expectations and how we go about achieving them.

Expectations for Election day

Hoala Greevy casting a ballot by mail in San Francsico | Election day is a Paubox holiday

Casting my ballot by mail in San Francisco

Here are the expectations I laid out to staff:

I don't care who you vote for. I care that you vote.
I expect 100% voter turnout

How we achieve 100% voter turnout

Jeff Tobler casting his early ballot in Utah | Election day is a Paubox holiday

Jeff Tobler casting his early ballot in Utah

Here's a playbook we built to achieve 100% voter turnout at Paubox:

Add Election day to the holiday calendar. Not every state makes it easy to vote by mail ahead of time. Give staff the day off to take care of business.
Frequent messaging. On Mondays we have a staff meeting via Zoom. Starting in August, I make a point to mention our objective of 100% voter turnout during my CEO remarks. I do my best to drive the point home every week:
- I don't care who you vote for. I care that you vote.
Simple surveys. Becky Hathaway, our VP of People, uses Paubox Forms to compile two anonymous surveys.
- The first survey has two simple questions:
  - Are you registered to vote?
  - How are you going to vote? (By mail / In person / I'm not going to vote)
- The second survey is even simpler:
  - Did you vote?
Assemble a skeleton crew. We still need staff to handle customer support. For those on the skeleton crew, we allow them to take another day off at their choosing.