We had a ton of great submissions for our Recognize Awards this year, and it warms our hearts to see so many examples of companies and leaders prioritizing a people-first approach to appreciation.

It certainly made the job of choosing winners more difficult, but that’s a good problem to have! And now, we’re happy to announce our 2025 winners:

• Best Recognition Strategy: Greenfield Global
• Best Employee Engagement: 4Refuel
• Best Change Management: NIBCO
• Best Offline Program: McCormick & Company
• Best Global Strategy: Hertz

Without further ado, let’s take a look at what each of our winners did to stand out from the crowd.

Best Recognition Strategy: Greenfield Global

Greenfield Global turned to Awardco to update their old recognition program. They wanted a transparent, digital-first approach that could effectively reach their office employees AND the 60% of their workforce who don’t work at a desk.

By investing in the program, and by designing their custom peer-to-peer Star program that gives employees a monthly budget of points to reward to their peers, Greenfield Global has reinforced their people-centric culture.

Not only that, but they display recognitions on company screens throughout each location, and they host a live company feed of appreciation to spread good feelings far and wide. These efforts have led to impressive results:

• eNPS went from 38 to 54
• 77% of employees recommend Greenfield Global as a great place to work
• 80% program utilization rate

Greenfield Global designed a purpose-driven recognition program that’s both meaningful and provides measurable benefits.

Best Employee Engagement: 4Refuel

Getting employees engaged is tricky, period—but getting employees engaged in your safety program? Most people would say that’s impossible. 

But not for 4Refuel.

With 75% of their employees working in the field, they knew they wanted to tie their safety program into their recognition strategy—and they used Awardco to do just that.

4Refuel built 10 different recognition programs, most focused on safety, including peer recognition built around core values, summer and winter seasonal safety campaigns, Safety All-Star programs, and monetary manager spot recognition.

Because of this focused effort, 4Refuel has seen:

• 65% YoY improvement in Serious Injury and Fatality Potential reporting
• 0 fatalities in 2024
• 42% decrease in high-risk behaviors since 2022
• 55% improvement in Recordable Injury Frequency since 2019

But safety behaviors aren’t the only benefits they’ve seen:

• 94% participation in seasonal safety campaigns
• 32% increase in Employee Net Promoter Score (eNPS)
• 24% decrease in YoY turnover
• 93% overall engagement score

Best Change Management: NIBCO

Trying to recognize employees on the manufacturing floor comes with specific challenges, but NIBCO knew it was vital to their company's long-term success. That’s why they’ve always had recognition programs. However, in 2024, they knew they needed to upgrade their platform.

They turned to Awardco to build a comprehensive, all-inclusive program that every employee could participate in, regardless of where they worked. By focusing on associate engagement, morale, and wellness with customized programs, they’ve seen:

• 8% reduction in turnover, saving them over $5.8 million in 2025
• 7,000+ recognitions since launching in January 2025
• 80% recognitions received rate

Switching from a piece-meal legacy platform to a new company-wide software is never easy, but NIBCO’s success shows that the right strategy can pay immediate dividends.

Best Offline Program: McCormick & Company

McCormick & Company prides itself on being a people-first organization, and with 14,000 employees around the world, 70% of which are on the frontline in manufacturing and distribution roles, that isn’t an easy feat.

They wanted to build a culture of everyday impactful recognition that fit seamlessly into their company’s strategic roadmap, and they turned to Awardco to make it happen.

They took advantage of the ease of access Awardco offers to spread their custom Bravo program to the frontline, ensuring everyone’s hard work is visibly recognized by both peers and managers. This has led to:

• 50% adoption in just one month, surpassing their goal of 45% in three months
• 6,500 peer recognitions in the first three months
• 1,200 administration hours saved each year via automation

Users score the program 4.2 out of 5 for ease of use and 4.0 out of 5 for impact on recognition culture, showing that both offline and online employees are feeling the warmth of appreciation.

Best Global Strategy: Hertz

How do you reach 27,000 employees in 160 different countries with a single recognition platform?

Hertz has the perfect answer to that.

They’ve used the flexibility of Awardco to build 10 different recognition programs, tailored to reach all of their employees. These programs include:

• Service anniversaries, birthdays, and peer-to-peer programs
• Corporate value-driven programs
• Employee Appreciation Day (which saw 1,300 different team members recognized in a single day!)
• Charitable Donation Program (where employees have already donated $40,000 year-to-date directly through the platform)
• “Win the Summer” program with fun themes, contests, and unique rewards

Through a robust recognition strategy and creative use of the platform, plus buy-in from the executive team downward, Hertz has seen a 7.6% year-over-year increase in their Employee Net Promoter Score (eNPS)—and they’re just getting started.

See what makes a Recognize Award winner

Recognize Awards are our way of highlighting the amazing work our customers are doing in recognizing, rewarding, and engaging their workforces. And we know many other organizations are accomplishing great things, too.

To learn more about our 2025 winners, past winners, and criteria for the awards to help make your case for next year, visit our Recognize Awards site.