Best Practices

Companies like Walt Disney World with over 180 such programs (Ligos,
2009) and Xcel Energy (Carrot) have documented the success of
employee recognition programs. Other successful benchmarks include
Nortel and PepsiAmericas (O.C.Tanner).

Indian Examples of successfully recognized practices include :

Wipro has a package called Encore, which is essentially a basket of

non-monetary rewards given to motivate employees and recognize
excellent work performance. For example, award Feather-in-My-Cap, is
an on-the-spot recognition of an effort awarded to a project or project
team; Dear Boss recognizes the positives of a good boss, including
technical, managerial, and leadership skills. Awards like Mastermind,
which notes the most innovation solution or idea in Wipro and The
Wipro Hall of Fame recognizes superlative performers in different roles
as well as superlative team performances.

In NIIT, there is a practice of naming a conference room or office or

training room after the name of the most outstanding employee of the
year. The naming is done ceremoniously, the employee family is
invited, a cake is ordered; and all the employees assemble for the
felicitation.

Johnson & Johnson has peer-to-peer recognition programs, where

employees submit nominations on behalf of other employees, teams or
oneself. All nominations are reviewed for a Merit Award and all Merit
Awards are reviewed for the Chairman Award.

The Eureka Award at HCL Comnet is for the entrepreneurs who come
up with the best business idea. The Value Creator Award is given in
appreciation of extraordinary individual initiative and innovation.

Gotcha recognizes top performers and ranks them on merit. Special

vacation packages are given to employees who excel in their targets.

Eicher In the non-financial part, offers perks like study leave, trips,
special training, challenging project opportunities, and flexible timings
based on individual need.

HICOM introduced three awards for employees who were nominated as

˜best leader, ˜best motivator, and best employee. The company also
introduced the new idea of appreciating subordinates through flower-
shaped cards. In addition, the HR department put a big wallboard titled
˜initiatives.com, which was filled with information on the initiatives
taken by the employees in the workplace and the appreciation of their
initiatives. The management as a policy honors an employee who
completes five years of services in HICOM with a gold plated
appreciation plaque.

The Taj group has patented a unique employee identification tracking

and reward programme branded the Star – Special Thanks and
Recognition System. It’s an HR initiative aimed at creating an
association between star performers and the Taj. The Star campaign
offers no cash awards. Recognition comes in the form of levels. Points
can be picked up by employees for integrity, respect and regard for
others, teamwork, environmental awareness, reliability, outstanding
work, courage of conviction and initiative.

Practical and useful suggestions that are beneficial to the company can
also earn an employee points. Many employees do that extra bit, go
out of the way to dazzle the customer satisfaction with employee
recognition. It is based on the premise that happy employees lead to
happy customers." However, while employees can earn merit points for
acts of excellence or valuable suggestions, one can also earn 20
"default merit" points if the review committee (comprising the GM,
training manager and all heads) fails to revert within 48 hours on a
suggestion made. Star has five recognition levels. Level 1 or the Silver
grade requires an employee to earn 120 points in three months, level 2
or the Gold grade can be reached with 130 points within three months
of reaching the Silver level. Level three or the Platinum grade requires
an employee to accumulate 250 points within six months of reaching
the Gold level. The highest grade at the corporate level is the MD’s
Club (at 760 points), below which at 510 points and above, an
employee can be part of the Chief Operating Officer’s club.

Intuit Technologies: Idea Jam

Employees are encouraged to spend up to 10% of their time to fix
problems, discover new tools and learn from colleagues. Employees
come up with an idea as a team or single act. Either the idea is
prepared ahead of time and explained in a presentation or worked at
the event over the course of a day. At the end, a panel of judges
determines the winners.
Another practice is highlighting employees that are doing things right.
Currently this is being done by news articles and updates on Intuit via
the company intranet (highlighting innovators) and via “Innov8,” a
recently launched a video series that also highlights innovators and
innovation best practices.

Tata Teleservices:
EPulse: to enhance engagement of employees by staying in touch and
taking feedback from them from the time they join the organization
Gyan Tarang: enables employees to self-nominate themselves as
Internal Trainers in their areas of expertise and impart knowledge to
the fellow employees

Monsanto India:
Rapid Recognition Award (RRA), to immediately commend outstanding
performance outside of that recognised by institutionalised awards.
Could be from peer to peer, supervisor to subordinate or subordinate
to supervisor. The award consists of a handwritten “I appreciate” note
and a memento.
Also have Insanely Great Customer Challenge Award etc. Safety focus
etc.

Kotak Mahindra*:
Recognition And Career Enhancement (RACE) is a program aimed at
the entire Sales force. It is a time-bound, automatic, transparent and
structured program based on performance.
I-Applaud: Platform which provides for informal recognition from co-
workers, supervisors or even subordinates.
Star Performers and Achievers: any person that strikes a sizeable deal
or brings in a critical customer is appreciated on the Intranet through
columns like “Big Hits of the Day”. All customer Appreciation that
comes to employees are posted on the Intranet under a section called
“Way to Go”.
Long Service Awards: to recognize the dedication and loyalty of people
who spend 5 years and above with the organization

Cognizant: It has been company policy since 1995-96 to give out gifts
to employees every time the company achieves a milestone.

When the company recently achieved the $1-billion revenue milestone,

it gave out the latest iPod Videos to 15,000 employees who had served
the organization for over a year.

Wipro: Offers employees a travel bonanza with family members for

their long stint in the organization. Long service awards such as the
Club 5, 10, 15 and so on where employees who have spent a particular
number of years in the company are recognized by the organization.
As a token of appreciation, Wipro gives out two-three day holiday
packages for the entire family for a destination within India.

Genpact: Has a web-based rewards and recognition programme that

runs on similar lines as airlines' frequent fliers programme. Any
Manager can go and reward an employee who has done well by
assigning reward points, which can be accumulated by the employee
and redeemed against various items such as golf sets, meal-for-two
vouchers, white goods, or holiday package for two to various
destinations.

The highest recognition under `Platinum Award' could be a fully-paid,

four-day trip to an overseas destination with the employees' spouses.
Talentica Software: Name-face recognition

Bajaj Capital: Rock star of the day

Performers across the regions that are appreciated on a daily basis
through this platform

At Federal Express, employees can get one of FedEx 500 aero-planes

named after his / her child.

Eureka Forbes: Circle of Champions*

Whirlpool: Wall of fame, Thank you notes

Godrej: Long service awards

Excellence in CSR: Tata Teleservices, Qualcomm, Infosys

Manufacturing and production sector: NTPC, Whirlpool,

Vishakhapatnam Steel Plant

Other Practices
- At a departmental level, managers can be creative (Golden Banana
@ HP)
- Customized gifts
- Safety awards for adherence and awareness of safety norms
- Points based system (Rideau)
- Service awards after every ‘n’ years
- ‘Good tries’ bulletin every month, recognize the effort
- Nomination of ‘experts’, allow employee to represent department,
representation at senior level meetings
- All positive customer feedback be publicly displayed
- Verbal or written acknowledgement/praise from Senior
Management
- Visible recognition on a bulletin board (Star of the week/month)
- Nomination of peers who have helped you
- Have a “Behind the Scenes” award specifically for those whose
actions are not usually in the limelight
- Highlight the individual and the accomplishment on the company
website/intranet/newsletter
- Have employees appear in company advertisements

Developmental opportunities, such as assignments to special projects

are also effective. Other forms of non monetary R&R include formal
and informal acknowledgement, assignment of more enjoyable job
duties, opportunities for training, and an increased role in decision-
making.