Explore the new State of Recognition 2026 report

 

Employee Birthdays & holidays

Celebrate festive occasions with style

Automate celebrations, personalize rewards, and ensure no special occasion goes unnoticed—regardless of where your employees are.

Return on recognition

Why celebrate birthdays and holidays at work?

Recognition doesn’t always have to be tied to performance. Celebrating birthdays and holidays offers an easy, reoccurring, and impactful way to show employees they matter. These personal moments deepen engagement and help create a culture of care that resonates far beyond the workplace.

Performance
Stock market trading screen with financial graphs on laptop
69
%
of employees say they would work harder if they felt more appreciated.
69
%
of employees say they would work harder if they felt more appreciated.

It's simple, really: appreciation increases feelings of self-worth and personal value, which helps employees want to put in the effort. And it can be as simple as a "Hey, great work today."

Retention
Factory workers in safety gear discussing project during industrial meeting
31
%
lower turnover in companies with strong recognition programs.
31
%
lower turnover in companies with strong recognition programs.

Appreciation leads to greater loyalty. Why? Because when people feel seen and appreciated through recognition, they feel a stronger connection to their workplace. It's simple psychology.

Satisfaction
Smiling senior professional in blue blazer during office meeting
81
%
of employees believe personalized recognition improves their workplace satisfaction.
81
%
of employees believe personalized recognition improves their workplace satisfaction.

General appreciation is great, but personalized is even better, and it doesn't have to be overwhelming. Automation tools, integrations, and more make it easier than ever.

end-to-end flexibility

Never miss a chance to celebrate

Whether it’s birthdays, national holidays, regional celebrations, or company-centric events, make these meaningful moments unforgettable.

Employee Birthdays

Meaningful birthday recognitions

Skip the generic card—and the hassle. Make every employee birthday celebration feel personal:

  • Celebrate peers in a dedicated birthday feed with custom messages
  • Share birthday shoutouts to Slack or monitors for (optional) company-wide visibility
  • Send points or curated gifts employees will actually love
  • Utilize user profiles to give thoughtful, interest-based gifts

testimonials

What customers are saying

Lockton
 
 
As we’ve scaled, we’ve lost the day-to-day visibility into our people. Awardco fills that gap. Peer recognition surfaces contributions that would otherwise go unnoticed—especially from introverts or quiet top performers.
Melissa York
SVP, Head of People & Culture
Lockton
 
 
Since implementing Awardco, we’ve saved at least 30 hours a month that used to be spent manually tracking, purchasing, and mailing gifts. Now it’s all automated—and more empowering for our associates.
Selia Wood
AVP, Talent & Engagement
Lockton
 
 
You get the same feeling when you are recognized as when you are recognizing someone else. Awardco gives you that platform and makes it so easy to gain those feelings. I love seeing my team being recognized or my leaders recognizing the teams.
Tisa Penny
Engagement & Events Lead, 2025 Recognition Rockstar Winner
WebPT
 
 
I cannot tell you what a relief it was to be able to integrate metadata from our HRIS system so that birthdays and service awards were automatically recognized and sent to our WebPTers. This was a huge, huge accomplishment for our employee engagement.
Britney Burns
Employee Experience Program Manager
Pacific Life
 
 
We do a lot of remote work activities where you can win something. We do a lot of these contests, and I used to go to Amazon and send a $25 gift card to the winners, but now I do it through Awardco. It's in the system, trackable, and much more streamlined.
Amberlee Taylor
Sr. Communications Specialist
Lockton
 
 
We created ‘Celebrating Culture’—a program where we reward engagement at everything from costume contests to lunch-and-learns. Awardco makes it easy to motivate and recognize employees both in person and remotely.
Tisa Penny
Engagement & Events Lead, 2025 Recognition Rockstar Winner
Dubai Airports
 
 
As a manager of a team of seven, I use High Flyer to recognize and thank my team each quarter. It makes them feel appreciated and motivated, knowing their efforts are seen.
Soosan Abidali
Office Manager, Strategy & Development, Dubai Airports
America First Credit Union
 
 
Previously, every manager hand-wrote a message to their employees every six months thanking them for their hard work, and it was all tied in with the bonus distribution. It was very high-touch, very labor intensive, and we had the process down to a science. We liked the connections that formed between managers and employees as a result of this program, but after COVID-19 most of our workforce went remote. Our semi-annual tradition wasn't possible any longer, nor was it feasible.
Kent Streuling
SVP of HR
ARUP Laboratories
 
 
There is never a good time to switch to a new system, but I also know that employees were eager for something new. Awardco has given us incredible power and flexibility with our recognition programs because of the millions of options to choose from, and the ability for employees to choose their own rewards has been a game changer. We know what we're getting, we know we're getting the best price, and our employees couldn't be happier.
Cheryl Vincent
Talent Development Manager
Ultradent Products
 
 
We're present in pretty much every continent in the world, and there's no limitation to our recognition system. We see recognitions from Brazil to the US, from Japan to China, from South Africa to France, and everyone is engaged.
Favio Paiva
Workday Specialist
Alera Group
 
 
Colleagues have to choose a value from The Collaborative Way when they recognize, making our recognition feed daily proof of why our values are so important. It’s such a powerfully positive place. Leaders are really taking notice—they want to see their teams at the top of the adoption leaderboard because they know the impact our values have on employee performance and retention.
Pam Johnson
VP of HR
Beckman Coulter
 
 
Change management was a concern when exploring new vendors. However, our leadership, HR, and associates have smoothly transitioned to Awardco, and they appreciate its straightforward and intuitive design, which surpasses the complexities of previous platforms.
Kerie Rogers
HR Operations Leader
BPM
 
 
We use recognition as a tool to motivate and encourage our employees—everyone knows Awardco because we actively use it for any and all incentives for employees.
Monica Delgado
Senior Manager of Total Rewards
CloudFit Software
 
 
Awardco has provided significant time savings. Our previous program was clunky, manual, and time consuming. Now, with the automation capabilities available through Awardco, my team saves 5-8 hours a week!
Kymberlee Stephens
Director of Employee Experience and Wellness
Beckman Coulter
 
 
As a platform administrator, Awardco stands out as the most user-friendly recognition platform I've ever used. Additionally, Awardco offers the flexibility for our company to incorporate custom resources such as videos, FAQs, and PDFs, enhancing the overall user experience for our associates.
Kerie Rogers
HR Operations Leader

Celebrate any special day

Make birthdays and holidays stand-out events that employees will love.