7 Amazing Employee Recognition Award Ideas

There is no sugarcoating it, there is no overemphasizing it, and talent is the most critical resource and source of success for any organization. No executive or manager can argue against this and this is why companies come up with robust recruitment strategies to ensure the right people with the right skills are filled into the right positions.

Without proper talent and execution, even the best business ideas are doomed to fail. In a world where businesses are having fairly equal access to capital and technology, human resources are quickly becoming the last major source of competitive advantage for businesses.

Getting great talents is the first hurdle an organization has to cross. After obtaining the right talents, there is the more difficult task of motivating them so they can perform at their very best.

A good paycheck seems like an easy way to motivate employees and boost their morale. But people want more than cash. Yes, cash is important in everyone’s life but it’s not all that matters. Employees want to be recognized and even rewarded for their efforts. And any serious organization will take full advantage of this to create an employee recognition system.

There are proven benefits of having an employee recognition system. It helps to create a good workplace culture while retaining workers. Employee productivity can go through the roof and that is not an over-exaggeration. There is also the benefit of aligning employees to company values.

There’s no time like right now to start recognizing and rewarding your employees for a job well done and below are some amazing employee recognition award ideas. Here we go:

1. Customer Service Award

Customers or clients are the lifeblood of any business. No customer, no business. This makes customer service of utmost importance to any business. A happy customer is bound to be a repeat customer and even refer to other people. There is nothing more powerful than word-of-mouth referrals in business.

Since customer service is important to the very survival of the business, it’s only natural that management rewards employees with a track record of keeping customers satisfied. It’s no easy task to satisfy a customer and workers that do this on a consistent basis deserve some form of recognition.

By creating a customer service award that is given out weekly or monthly, award winners are motivated to continue their good work while non-winners will strive to get their hands on this much-coveted prize.

2. Retirement Award

Retirement is a major milestone in life. Chances are that when someone is retiring in an organization, they’ve spent some time there. So, when they finally hang their boots, they deserve to be recognized for years of loyalty and servitude.

Upper management can explore different retirement award ideas and come up with different creative ways to make retirement more special. When current employees see how retirees are treated, they’ll be motivated to remain at the organization.

3. Employee of The Month or Year Award

It’s become standard practice in many organizations to recognize outstanding employees at the end of the month or year. Some firms even have awards for employee of the week.

Everyone likes being recognized and appreciated. And having an award for the best-performing employee will create healthy competition and make employees strive to perform at their best. It also boosts employee engagement and retention.

4. Teamwork Awards

Every organization needs a cheerleader, someone who gets along with everybody else and knows how to motivate others or increase collaboration. While everyone doesn’t have to be a cheerleader, an organization can do with a couple of them.

The idea behind the teamwork award isn’t to make everyone into a cheerleader. Instead, it’s to boost participation and improve collaboration between team members.

5. Employees’ Choice Awards

How about creating an award for the people and being voted by the people? Sounds like democracy, right? Well, organizations can always benefit from a healthy dose of democracy.

Employees’ choice awards are rewards for people that are popular among their colleagues. Ask for nominations from employees. This can be done formally through online forms or informally through conversations with employees.

6. Always Growing Award

Organizations are supposed to encourage employees to improve both personally and professionally. Companies can contribute to the development of employees by organizing training and development programs. But improvement shouldn’t only be limited to career performance. Recognize workers that have grown as individuals and leaders.

7. Excellent Feedback Award

Employee feedback is crucial to assessing the morale level in the organization and has an important impact on employee engagement. When feedback is given tactfully, it can help break bad habits or culture and create a more harmonious working environment.