Activate Employee Recognition with Internal Champions

Many organisations implement company-wide recognition platforms to recognise employees, but don’t leverage champions to bring their recognition strategies to life. Only 41% of organisations have a recognition champions programme.

Creating a champion network can accelerate adoption, alignment, and long-term impact. Read on to learn how.

What are internal champions for a recognition programme?

Internal employee recognition champions are a network of team members who inspire and rally others around recognition. They advocate for, promote, model, and support recognition in ways that strengthen workplace relationships. The idea of champions is not new; many companies already have culture, engagement, and wellbeing champions who are critical to boosting engagement with HR initiatives.

The most effective internal recognition champions have both the excitement and passion for employee recognition as well as the empowerment and autonomy to advocate for recognition and make it a lasting part of the culture.

Why have a recognition champions network?

Effective champions not only promote the practice of recognition but also transform how employees perceive recognition and culture at your organisation. When organisations have a recognition champions programme:

• 88% of employees feel it is effective overall
• 71% say it helps foster a healthy workplace culture
• 64% say it plays an important role in launching and sustaining their recognition programme
• 88% would recommend expanding their champions network in the future
• Employees are 3x more likely to give recognition regularly

In addition to the impact on recognition programmes themselves, having champions in the organisation leads to employees who are:

• 3x more likely to say recognition builds community
• 4x more likely to say recognition helps them grow in their careers
• 3x more likely to have higher engagement

Recognition champions also improve business outcomes:

• 4x higher odds of innovation
• 3x higher odds of retention
• 3x higher odds of great work
• 2x higher odds of promoting the organisation

Incredibly, 60% of employees at organisations without a recognition champions programme would recommend adding one.

How to find and create your internal champion network

Remember that recognition champions are fulfilling this role in addition to their normal job duties. You’ll want to create a network of volunteer employees and give them the resources and support to be successful in this role.

Here are six best practices for developing internal champions:

1. Design a structure for your champion network. Clarify objectives, goals, responsibilities, and success metrics. About 70% of champions are in their roles for less than a year and interact with employees about once a month.  ‍
2. Ask for recognition champion volunteers. You want someone who believes in recognition and has a heart for promoting it. ‍
3. Utilise a formal application process so potential champions understand the role is important. Clearly communicate what their responsibilities are, how they apply, and how they are selected.
4. ‍Host a formal kickoff for your champion network. Build excitement and community and provide clarity around their role and expectations. Tie their role back to current (and target) metrics and outline their next steps as champions. ‍
5. Train champions on how to influence recognition and build momentum. Give them resources and practical tools they can leverage and tailor to fit their local needs. ‍
6. Continue to engage internal recognition champions regularly. Have them meet quarterly or every few months to share and learn best practices, get their feedback on what’s happening with recognition around the organisation, and report on progress or metrics that have resulted from their champion activities.

If you have an existing champion network for other culture initiatives, it may be more efficient to include recognition into those existing networks instead of creating an additional champion network.

Most importantly, empower your recognition champions and give them autonomy to improve recognition strategy and tools at your organisation.

Need help starting a recognition champions network? Our Culture Consultants can help.

The role of a recognition internal champion network 

Recognition champions facilitate recognition that strengthens social ties at work by sharing their experiences and building relationships. Their feedback and experiences influence how employees will perceive and use recognition—employees see recognition modeled by someone they respect, learn what good recognition looks like, and then give recognition more consistently.  

The main role of a recognition champion network is to inspire and promote employee recognition across the company. Internal recognition champions may:

• Communicate about and promote recognition and recognition tools
• Share stories about employee successes and how employees are recognised
• Answer questions and provide best practices on how to use recognition tools
• ‍Ensure recognition tools are available and accessible to all
• ‍Encourage leaders to model recognition
• Inspire and encourage employees to recognise one another
• Look for opportunities to integrate recognition into the flow of work
• ‍Model recognition by recognising others
• Report out on metrics and successes with current recognition tools
• Collaborate with the Recognition team and other champions to improve, grow, and evolve recognition programmes

Don’t forget to recognise and reward their successes as a recognition champion and invite them to help to plan what’s next for recognition at your company.

Examples of successful recognition champion networks

The Auto Club Group

To build adoption and engagement for their Celebrate as One recognition programme, the Auto Club Group created a robust champion network of over 180 employees who act as trainers, coaches, and influencers for recognition. They worked with O.C. Tanner to develop a unique champion logo and swag and empower their champions to develop training and educational content around recognition, spread awareness through communication campaigns, and customise and improve their recognition tools.

As a result of the champion group’s efforts, ACG saw:

• 97% of employees recognised
• eCard usage increase almost 7x from their previous programme
• Award nominations increase from 54,000 to 89,000 per year
• ACG was recognised as a top place to work for the past 2 years
  

“I think that the launch of our champions team was so pivotal in our engagement in the adoption process. One of the benefits of our champions team: champions could potentially reach all our employee groups. They provide real time support and resources for employees to ask questions to learn best practices on how to appreciate.

It really changes the culture from ‘this is a corporate programme’ to ‘this is our programme’. This is our culture. This is our recognition platform."
— Toi Johnson, Employee Programmes and Experience Specialist, ACG

Hear directly from AAA – The Auto Club Group about how they leverage recognition champions to bring recognition to life.

CIBC

Working with O.C. Tanner, CIBC built an extensive network of 150 recognition champions across the bank to help plan recognition events and budgets and answer questions about their MomentMakers recognition programme. Many champions serve on other committees in their business units, like Employee Experience, so recognition is aligned with other people initiatives across the bank.

With the help of this champion network, within 12 months of the launch of MomentMakers:

• Over 70% of employees receive recognition
• eCard usage increased 5x and award nominations increased 9x compared to their previous programme
• 85% of employees feel “My personal contributions are recognised”

IAG

IAG’s extensive Culture Amplifier network meets regularly to review insights and data and share ideas on how they are embedding culture initiatives like employee recognition within their respective businesses. The Culture Amplifier network was critical to the success of IAG’s refreshed recognition framework:

• Within 14 months of the launch of their new recognition solution, 100% of employees had received and 90% of managers have given recognition
• Odds of employees reporting stronger pride in IAG, likelihood to recommend IAG as a place to work, and giving stronger discretionary effort increased

Learn more about the impact and role of recognition champions in The State of Employee Recognition 2026 from O.C. Tanner.