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Companies have been recognizing employees for their length of service since the late 1800s. Today these programs, which are utilized by 90% of Best Practice organizations, aren’t just limited to recognition of service anniversaries.

The technological advancements in recognition software are being adopted by HR teams across the world.  With the HR role stretched to included more and more responsibilities, this group is looking for ways to automate and assist with recognition initiatives and other strategic endeavors. From a simple system that sends out an email to a manager alerting them an employee is celebrating an anniversary next month to a complex system to support budgets with a tiered hierarchy, these tools are a way to complement and support the organization’s recognition strategies, not hinder or replace human communication.

We sometimes sit in amazement at the frequency with which we encounter employee recognition programs that aren’t tethered directly to a company’s enterprise strategy. Examples include recognition programs that reward values rather than behaviors that are linked to performance. This makes it nearly impossible to measure business impact. Also quite common are programs that have been deployed on a one-size-fits-all basis. This overlooks fundamental differences between employees in different parts of the organization.