Awards Recognition Ideas

By: Anna Tomakh
Date: Sep 05, 2018
Comment: 0
Category: Awards Management

If you’ve ever been in a setting where achievement matters, you know that the acknowledgement of this achievement matters even more. Be it a student or a company CEO, everyone needs to understand the value of his/her work. Still, it’s not right to think about recognition in terms of a “pat on the back” experience only. A top-notch idea for awards can actually have a much greater impact – from reducing employee turnover to founding a business.

In this post, we’ve curated a short list of impactful awards recognition ideas related to different spheres, which go further than just honouring an achievement.

Reasons for recognition

You can use recognition as a tool that helps you reach an unbelievable number of goals. For the volunteer community, awards are a primary retention booster. In terms of academic settings, you can use contests to help people learn, win scholarships, and develop skills. Career advancement is something that can be achieved through awards recognition in the corporate sector. We combined the key perks of awards experiences in this short list:

Satisfaction. It’s hard to be a successful manager, employee, or student if you can’t enjoy what you do. Greater enjoyment of work is an important part of any recognition program.
Employee retention. Although technologies are changing and growing faster than ever before, there’s one business value that is not going away. This value is called long-term cooperation. Business owners don’t want to waste their precious time on training new employees. This is why awards that fuel retention help organisations work efficiently and achieve more in the long run.
Collaboration. Strengthening the ties that bind a team is a goal many organisations are striving for. Whether it’s a group project or a peer-recognition program, contests can be great incentives that make people relate to each other.
New ideas. Believe it or not, there are student recognition awards ideas that can turn an 18-year-old into a successful entrepreneur. Whether in an academic setting or a business, creativity is an integral part of awards recognition that can give your organisation a new breath.
Communicating a mission. Especially if you work with a team of volunteers, a mission is your bread and butter. Awards programs that are linked with a mission of an organisation help create a shared vision for what people are striving to achieve in a workplace or an academic setting.
Feedback. To achieve more, you have to know which direction to go. Internal awards programs involve frequent performance evaluations. By collecting direct feedback, employees get great guidance.

Best awards recognition ideas

So how do you create a non-boring awards recognition event that matches your goals? First, we recommend choosing a creative theme that can help you weave a story for your event. For instance, if you set up an event for a tech company, you can pick one specific technology that will be a “signature dish”, like VR or AI robots. This will generate ideas for entertainment, branding, catering, and much more.

Here are some cool ideas that we hope will inspire you:

Aflac Appreciation Week

In terms of recognition awards ideas for employees, an “Employee of the Year” ceremony is no longer at the forefront. There are thousands of other creative ways to make your staff happy.

Aflac, one of the best companies to work for in the U.S. according to FORTUNE Magazine, rewards employee achievements in a week-long celebration. From funny recognition awards to more formal appreciation ceremonies, Aflac prepares something for everyone. The big idea behind the appreciation week is immersing employees in an environment where they can connect, reinforce company values, and get a pat on the back.

Red Dot Awards Museums

If you know anything about design, you have heard about the Red Dot Awards. The Oscars of the design industry, Red Dot breaks down the design into the disciplines of product design, design concept, and communication design. In addition to a sophisticated judging process and a fabulous awards ceremony, the organisation has also opened three museums in different countries to exhibit the winners’ works.

The lesson we can learn from the Red Dot Awards is about long-term value creation. If it’s possible in your setting, think about how you could tweak the conventional idea of an award to make it longstanding. Maybe your organisation could create a yearbook based on the results of a contest, or a winner could get a chance to speak at an international conference. To put it simply, ensure your contest brings value to the winners – not only today but in a year as well.

Google Science Fair

Idea generation is the core of many recognition programs. This explains the immense popularity of hackathons and startup pitching contests – events at which products or even businesses can be born.

If you are on the hunt for recognition awards ideas for students, Google Science Fair would be a perfect example. The event has a format of an online science and engineering competition for students aged 13-18. Working in small groups, teens develop tech solutions that are then evaluated either by peers or by a professional panel of judges. The prizes are incredible, ranging from a $50,000 scholarship to participation in a National Geographic expedition.

Conclusion

The realities of productivity in a modern workspace are much more sophisticated than they were just a decade ago. Today, you can’t just give your employees more money to inspire them towards productive work. No matter what setting we are talking about, smart company awards recognition ideas are about growth, long-standing value, and collaboration. We hope that these three truly unique recognition ideas will make your next awards ceremony unforgettable.