Recognition Supports Company’s Values

TARGET AUDIENCE
Major telecommunications organization with over 90,000 participants

SITUATION

Culture of inconsistent and unbalanced Recognition practices for both sales and non-sales divisions
Non-efficient approach to Recognition. Each division (17) was running separate programs; all unable to track costs or manage budgets.

OBJECTIVES
Impact Company’s Culture

Role model Company’s values through consistently recognizing employees demonstrating those qualities across all divisions.
Promote the involvement of every employee in watching for and recognizing Excellence in their peers, managers, and direct reports.
Utilize an online recognition system that would make it:
- Easy to recognize someone.
- Easy for top level Managers and Executives to select top honorees quarterly.
- Easy to capture recognition history for future managers to use in evaluating promotions/compensation
  Less costly to administer.
Utilize a discretionary vehicle allowing management to recognize the individuals demonstrating the core values of the Company.

SOLUTION
Implemented powerful Recognition platform and program that:

Changed the company’s use of Recognition from an ‘after-thought’ to a ‘priority’ – institutionalizing a ‘Culture of Recognition’
Clearly tied Recognition with corporate values and strategies
Streamlined and managed all divisions’ Recognition criteria, reporting, and tracking

Made it easy to:

Recognize employees immediately and often for demonstrating corporate values
Prompt peer-to-peer Recognition (reward co-workers for excellence) and encourage observation of peers’ Best Practices
Formal Recognition honorees both quarterly and annually
Track and report Recognition history

SMART FEATURES
Web Platform: Everything necessary to participate in recognizing each other was available online. The program used a Point-based reward system redeemable for high-quality merchandise.

On-The-Spot: Immediate notification of recognition along with the award being automatically deposited to the employee’s account.

Quarterly Excellence: Immediate notification of the recognition; quarterly selection of honoree to be determined by Vice President or designated selection committee from the pool of nominations made during the quarter; honoree to receive immediate notification of recognition along with the award being automatically deposited to the honoree’s account. Recognition history displayed every time an individual was selected as an honoree.

Annual Excellence: Selected from quarterly honorees by top level Managers and Executives, with notification of recognition along with the award being automatically deposited to the annual honoree’s account. Recognition history displayed every time an individual was selected as an honoree.

Leadership: Annual nomination and selection process for Director level and above.

RESULTS

In the first three quarters, nominations went from 300 to 1200, signaling engagement, and remained at significantly improved levels throughout the program.
Continuous growth in nominations. Nominators and Nominees caused an increased awareness in what this organization values. The planned public recognition gave Executives the platform to talk about their goals and the activities and behaviors of those being recognized, thus, assuring their Company’s position as a leader in its industry, providing the role modeling for others to emulate, and significantly impacting the Company’s culture.

NOTE:

Nominees increased when teams became easier to recognize.
Not all nominations/nominees received an award other than the recognition itself.