TL;DR: 

Large companies benefit from automated, scalable recognition programs. Mid-sized companies thrive with peer-to-peer programs and structured digital tools. Small businesses shine by offering personalized, cost-effective appreciation that makes each employee feel seen.

No matter your size, there are quality employee recognition ideas for large and small companies. It’s all about providing consistent and meaningful appreciation. We’ve got those solutions ready for you.

Recognition ideas for businesses of every size

Employee Appreciation Day is the first Friday of every March, and it’s the perfect time to show employees how much they matter. When done right, appreciation and recognition can unlock stronger engagement, lower turnover, and higher productivity across your organization.

The good news? There’s a clear path to getting it right. While only 27% of employees currently feel recognized, that means there's a wide-open opportunity for organizations to stand out. In fact, companies that prioritize appreciation see their employees become 45% less likely to leave and far more motivated to contribute at their best.

Want to boost retention and build a stronger culture? In this post, we’ll share the most effective employee recognition ideas for large and small companies and everyone in between. 

Why does employee appreciation matter?

Let’s return to the benefits of appreciation mentioned above and share specific stats to make this point clear. 

Employee appreciation:

• Lowers voluntary turnover as noted above
• Drives successful business outcomes by 12X 
• Decreases burnout
• Increases employee connection to company culture by 5X
• Improves engagement by 4X

To sum it all up, 81% of surveyed employees who reported being very satisfied also reported a culture of appreciation at their companies, while “94% of employees who feel highly appreciated love their workplace.” 

When companies build methods of systematic recognition and appreciation, where employees frequently get recognized for their work and shown appreciation for who they are, they respond with the positive behaviors every company wants.

The best employee recognition ideas begin with feedback

Showing meaningful appreciation is difficult because everyone is different. On top of that, different-sized companies require different recognition solutions. While we can’t provide the perfect solutions for everyone, we can provide helpful best practices for each type of business.

But first, the first employee appreciation best practice applies to every organization of any size: gather employee feedback and start from there. Leaders have to understand what they’re doing right and where they can improve in their recognition efforts.

Send out surveys and have managers conduct one-on-one meetings to compile data on how your employees are feeling. Do they feel noticed or cared for by their managers or by the executive team? Do they resent the lackluster birthday gifts or cookie-cutter employee service awards you might offer?

After you know how your employees are feeling, you can try the following recognition ideas for enterprise, medium, and small businesses. 

How can large companies show employee appreciation? 

As an enterprise company, how do you show the appreciation employees deserve without obliterating your budget or spending hundreds of hours? How do you ensure that no one is missed or left out? 

1. Create and implement recognition practices from the top down

No matter what practices or programs you want to update, implement, or improve, you need to start from the top of your organization and go down. When everyone, from the CEO and other executives to managers and team leads, shows genuine appreciation to those around them, your culture of gratitude, engagement, and satisfaction grows.

These top-down appreciation programs build a culture of acceptance and appreciation. When you encourage managers and leaders to recognize those around them, the HR team doesn’t have to oversee everything—you can rely on team leads and managers to carry out recognition. Once you get the ball rolling, employee appreciation can become a self-perpetuating machine of gratitude and care.

One of the best and easiest ways to accomplish this is with a recognition platform. The Awardco platform allows you to easily manage and automate recognitions, including birthdays, service anniversaries, onboarding, wellness programs, sales incentives, and safety programs. Plus, we allow super simple and easy manager-to-employee recognitions. Easily and powerfully build a culture of connection with employee recognition.

2. Use opportunities to appreciate & recognize everyone at once

Employee Appreciation Day is a fantastic opportunity to show everyone at your large company how much you appreciate them. No, that recognition may not be highly personal, but you have the chance to thank each employee for their work by giving them free lunch, an extra day off, or other celebratory gifts.

One of our customers, a large financial firm with over 250,000 global employees, takes this further. They do an Employee Appreciation Week throughout the entire first week in March. 

Other ideas include hosting a monthly birthday party to celebrate each employee's birthday last month and creating fun holiday parties for holidays like National Donut Day or National Video Game Day. 

These engaging and fun events can be the perfect opportunity to show how much you value your employees. And if you need help throwing an office-wide party (even for those remote employees!), we’ve got you covered with our celebration kits.

3. Never let milestones go by

A lot of employees means a lot of birthdays and service anniversaries to remember. However, these gestures are essential for demonstrating appreciation, because few things feel more discouraging than having a special occasion overlooked.

Use software to automate these dates so that you don’t have to keep track of every anniversary yourself. When you remember to recognize every milestone in each employee’s life (and reward them with gifts they’ll love), you walk the appreciation walk instead of only talking the talk.

Here’s a real-life example: One Awardco client, Pilot Flying J (Pilot Company), used Awardco to reach its employees across all departments more effectively without increasing admin burdens. It created five different custom recognition programs, but with our automation capabilities, it saved time and hassle compared to its previous vendor. With five custom programs powered by automation, they saw a 960% increase in recognition and a 96% engagement rate in just five months.

With Awardco, you can easily see, recognize, and reward employees for special occasions such as their birthday, their work anniversary, or other life events.

What are employee appreciation tips for mid-market companies?

Organizations with a few hundred employees must find the right balance of personal appreciation solutions and time-efficient methods. Here are some ways to achieve this.

1. Set up structured recognition programs

Spontaneous shoutouts are great, but they don’t scale well for growing mid-sized companies. Structured programs are great because they make it easy to spread appreciation without losing the personalization and genuineness that’s vital to effective recognition.

Structured recognition programs can include anything, such as:

• Peer-to-peer recognition that allows employees to recognize each other
• Incentives to drive behaviors and build excitement
• Holiday programs to give personalized gifts and host activities

2. Use technology to help

Small businesses can get away with completely analog recognition, but mid-market organizations need digital tools to find the right balance. Platforms like Awardco can provide tools to boost engagement and make HR’s lives easier, including:

• Custom programs with variable rewards and customized branding
• Automated reporting, budgeting, communication, and more
• Digital reward catalogs to eliminate manual processes, fulfillment, and gift cards

3. Lean into peer recognition

Mid-market organizations come with growing pains, such as how do you spread meaningful recognition to your growing employee base? Luckily, leaders don’t have to do everything themselves.

Peer-to-peer recognition is an excellent solution for mid-sized companies because it allows employees to recognize and show appreciation for each other. Since employees work with their colleagues more often than they work with the CEO, recognition from their colleagues is going to mean a lot.

What are appreciation tips for small businesses?

Small businesses often can’t match big corporations when it comes to benefits and perks. However, what they can do uniquely well is create a culture of appreciation that employees love. Here are some ways to do so.

1. Develop spot recognition strategies

Spot recognition is recognition that happens on the spot. In Awardco’s experience, we found that SMBs often struggle with spot recognition compared to larger companies. Luckily, we also have the solution.

AwardCodes are customizable cards with messages and points (if desired) that SMBs can brand, order, and then give out to employees whenever they see something worth recognizing. 

2. Think of cost-effective appreciation

Not all employee appreciation has to be expensive—in fact, some of the most effective solutions are totally free! 

Here are some ideas:

• Handwritten notes from managers or other company leaders
• Public shoutouts during company meetings or on social media
• Flexible hours, recognizing that everyone has different needs and work preferences
• Recognition from the CEO
• Floating holidays to ensure everyone has the time off they need for days that matter to them

3. Prioritize service anniversaries

Small businesses are constantly competing with larger companies that can offer higher salaries and better benefits. To show appreciation for the employees who stay, consider giving service anniversary awards every year.

It doesn’t have to be a big cash bonus or anything fancy, but it should be something the recipient wants. Yes, that rules out plaques, mugs, jewelry, coolers, and watches.

How do you appreciate remote employees?

Employee appreciation may seem more difficult for virtual teams, but you actually have a lot of options for recognizing and celebrating them in both big and small ways.

Here are some great virtual appreciation ideas for large companies:

• Social media shout-out. Use your online platforms to recognize and thank virtual employees who are giving their best efforts. This cost-effective method of showing your appreciation will mean a lot, especially because it’s public, so it may lead to peer-led appreciation as well.
• Virtual birthdays and celebrations. Don’t forget about remote employees’ special days. Host virtual parties and send gift baskets to their home to show how much you appreciate them. For Employee Appreciation Day, offer virtual games, deliver snacks, or give some extra time off to really show you care!
• Face-to-face thank you. One of the hardest parts of remote work is reduced face-to-face interaction. Encourage managers and leaders to use Zoom or other video call tools to offer appreciation. This extra effort will show employees how much they matter.
• Gifts. As mentioned above, care packages for birthdays are a great idea. But you don’t have to wait for a birthday! You can send virtual gift cards to employees’ favorite restaurants or stores, buy food or flower delivery to their home, or give virtual recognition simply to thank them for being awesome!
• Traditional mail. Who even gets mail nowadays? Other than bills and spammy coupons, mail isn’t very exciting. So just think of how cool it would be to get a handwritten letter from your boss expressing their appreciation for your work! This type of appreciation may take some extra time, but it’s extremely cost-effective for the company.
• Recognition through existing tools. If you already have large communication channels like Slack or Microsoft Teams, you can integrate those channels with Awardco and make recognition a part of everyone’s daily work life, even if they’re remote. Automation and simplicity can make this a powerful tool in your belt for building culture, no matter where your employees work.

Appreciation is even more important than normal for remote employees. With a lack of social connections and interactions, remote employees may struggle with morale, focus, or satisfaction in work. Showing remote workers that you care about them and notice them can make a huge difference in their wellbeing.

A look at Employee Appreciation Day 

We already mentioned it before, but Employee Appreciation Day is the first Friday in March. Because this post is all about how to show employees appreciation, we think this holiday deserves a special section all to itself. So if you’ve wondered how to celebrate Employee Appreciation Day or wanted to get gift ideas for it, you’re in the right place.

When is Employee Appreciation Day?

Employee Appreciation Day is on March 7th in 2025, but it changes every year. It’s on the first Friday each March, and here’s a quick rundown of the next few holidays so that you can get them on your calendar now:

• 2026: March 6th
• 2027: March 5th
• 2028: March 3
• 2029: March 2

What are the best ways to celebrate Employee Appreciation Day?

When you’re planning your celebration, there are some general best practices to follow to really make your Employee Appreciation Day stand out. 

Some of these include:

• Don’t assume everyone will like the same thing. It’s nearly impossible to please everyone all the time, but do your best not to make people uncomfortable with activities. For example, don’t require everyone to get in front of the company to accept an award if they hate being in front of crowds.
• Don’t provide cookie-cutter gifts. Whether you send a care package, give out gift bags, or hand out swag, giving everyone the exact same thing is a recipe for disaster. Most people won’t feel appreciated by a mug or a t-shirt.
• Don’t make it feel like an afterthought. Employees are really good at detecting sincerity. If your Employee Appreciation Day celebration ideas feel disingenuous or shallow, they’ll know it. If you’re going to put in any effort, go all the way to make your people really feel valued.

Employee Appreciation Day ideas

Now that we have the general advice out of the way, let’s dive into the more specific Employee Appreciation Day celebration ideas.

1. Plan an in-office event

For employees who work in or live close to the office, an event of some kind can be a fun way to celebrate. Think of something more creative, interactive, and fun than the standard pizza party, such as:

• A talent show
• A game day with stations for video, board, and outside games
• A murder mystery party
• A volunteer day of service
• A potluck with optional cooking/baking competitions or classes
• A scavenger hunt with cash or points up for grabs

Show appreciation for the hard work your people put in by giving them this time to step away from work, get to know their peers, and have some fun. Many of these ideas are relatively inexpensive, so you can easily plan something that falls within your budget.

For remote employees, consider digital events and games to allow them to socialize with each other and take a break from their work.

2. Give everyone points on an employee recognition platform

Giving Employee Appreciation Day gifts is a good idea, but it’s really hard to choose a gift that will satisfy everyone. And the last thing you want is your gift to sit on a shelf unused or (even worse) thrown away.

Avoid the guesswork and manual fulfillment of gifts and instead give everyone some points on a recognition platform. This way, everyone can choose a gift that’s meaningful and useful to them, and no one will be disappointed. These points will reach remote, hybrid, and in-person employees equally.

Plus, platforms like Awardco let you automate the point distribution to take that off your plate, and you can automate recognition reminder emails for leaders so that everyone remembers that it’s Employee Appreciation Day.

3. Set up internal award ceremonies

Organize fun and inclusive internal award ceremonies. The key here is to reach every employee with creative and specific awards that show that leaders notice and care about each person’s contributions. Think of awards like this:

• The “Gucci” award for the person with the best corporate casual style
• The “Get Stuff Done” award for whoever is extra productive
• The “Always Punctual” award for the person who’s always on time
• The “Gordon Ramsey” award for whoever brings in the best lunches
• The “Happy Little Accident” award for the eternal optimist

If your company is small, do a big company celebration. If it’s large, split it up into departments or teams and let team leaders present these awards to their team members.

Everyone brings something to your organization, and these creative awards are a great way to convey your appreciation for each employee’s unique personality and value.

4. Plan a field trip

Choose a location that will keep everyone interested and provide travel so that no one has to stress about driving, traffic, carpooling, or the like.

Some ideas for fun day activities include:

• An escape room
• A museum
• An amusement park
• A picnic and games in a park
• An arcade
• A fancy restaurant
• A concert
• A sports game

Whatever you choose, make sure that there are things for everyone to do and be interested in—for example, if you survey your employees and learn that most people don’t like sports, don’t take everyone to an NBA game.

5. A week of professional growth opportunities

Extend Employee Appreciation Day into Employee Appreciation Week and provide opportunities to learn and gain new skills. Here’s a potential week’s schedule to give you ideas:

• Monday: Set up a mentorship program where junior employees can shadow senior employees to learn more about the company and work that they’re interested in.
• Tuesday: Give everyone the opportunity to choose a MasterClass course that they’re interested in and watch it during work.
• Wednesday: A day of speakers and workshops for people to learn more about topics such as self-care, financial wellness, career development, public speaking, etc.
• Thursday: Provide resources and time to help each employee work toward their own personal passion. Maybe they want to write a novel, design a video game, start a business, or illustrate children’s books. Whatever it is, find a way to help!
• Friday: Give everyone the day off!

Employee appreciation activities like this will show people that you care about their professional and personal success.

6. Host hobby stations

A day of learning a new hobby would be fun for everyone. For instance, set up stations around the office where employees can learn more about cooking, painting, sculpting, origami, whittling, storytelling, flower arranging, book binding, or anything else!

Create a dedicated space for each class and make sure that you’ve found a skilled professional to lead each class.

You also need to make each class remote-friendly. Set up Zoom capabilities to record each class so that remote employees can participate as well.

7. Provide services that take weight off employee shoulders

Think about those annoying things that everyone has to deal with but no one wants to. Things like changing your car’s oil, getting a haircut, going to the dentist, or something similar. One way to show appreciation to employees is to make these actions easier and more affordable for them.

Bring these services to the office and allow employees to take advantage of them throughout the week. Consider services such as:

• Mobile oil change service
• In-office massage or spa treatments
• Mobile dental, ophthalmologist, or doctor visits
• In-office mental health counselor visits
• In-office haircuts

For remote employees, send gift cards or curated care packages, depending on what you do in the office. If you do spa treatments, send out a self-care package with wellness items. For an oil change, send out a Jiffy Lube gift card or something similar.

Show appreciation, no matter what

Whether your business has 10 or 10,000 employees, you need to ensure that each one feels noticed and valued. The benefits of purposeful, genuine appreciation are impossible to deny, and it’s time that businesses take the extra steps needed to build recognition and appreciation into their value proposition.

We hope these tips are helpful as you celebrate Employee Appreciation Day, build new recognition programs, offer better rewards, start holding incentives, or whatever goals your business has for the year. And if you want to learn more about how Awardco can help with all of that, schedule a demo here.