Research Studies

Most Employee Recognition Programs Do Not Meet CEO Expectations

No author cited
Globoforce, January 2009

Available online

Globoforce, a global employee recognition strategist and technology provider, found in a recent survey of 150 middle- and senior-level human resources, finance and procurement personnel that organizations still have a long way to go in aligning recognition programs with their company's mission, values, strategic objectives and goals.

Key findings include:

• Almost nine out of 10 HR respondents (88 percent) believe their recognition programs need improvement and that their CEO would agree.
• While a 58 percent of HR leaders believe their CEO would say their recognition programs reinforce the strategy and values of the organization, 42 percent say their programs offer no strategic benefit to their organizations, indicating a waste of resources and misappropriated recognition investment that have no effect on employee engagement and motivation.
• Forty-five percent of HR leaders feel their programs fall short in driving bottom line results.
• Not only are companies by and large not building their recognition programs to "CEO code" – a program that is aligned with the organization's strategy, mission, values and behaviors – but a staggering 38 percent of all organizations surveyed are not measuring their program's results in any way, leaving CEOs in the dark on the effectiveness and true value of their recognition programs.

Based on these results, Globoforce recommends that to build a successful recognition program, HR leaders need a set of best practices that are true human capital strategic initiatives, such as the following:

• Formulate a clear global strategy for recognition: Develop a philosophy of recognition that mirrors company strategic objectives and use this as the basis for a manager training program.
• Secure an executive sponsor to communicate regularly with employees: Use the global reach, influence and visibility of an executive to promote the recognition program across the company. Be sure to incorporate multiple media such as posters, videos, e-mail messages, and newsletter articles so all employees are impacted by the communication program.
• Tie recognition to the company values and strategic objectives: By linking all behaviors and actions recognized to a company value demonstrated or strategic objective achieved, employees understand how their daily actions impact the success of the organization as a whole, which gives them purpose and satisfaction in their work. This approach also clearly defines criteria for recognition that apply universally for all employees, everywhere in the world.
• Make the program available to all: By opening a recognition program to all employees via a peer-to-peer recognition model, all employees are encouraged to notice the above-and-beyond efforts of their colleagues and reward them accordingly.
• Offer a global reward of choice: Personally meaningful and, critically, culturally relevant rewards are the lynchpin of a successful global strategic recognition program. All employees deserve to have a wide range of choice available to them.