Tom Conran
Reward and recognition programmes are a staple of any successful employee engagement strategy. The link between effective recognition and building a happy, engaged and productive workforce has been proven, but that doesn't make it any easier to secure the buy-in you need for launching an R&R scheme or increasing the impact of your existing programme.
Research conducted by Reward Gateway | Edenred, as well as other industry experts, points to a detrimental effect on the organisations who fail to provide effective reward and recognition to their employees. Put simply, these organisations are suffering from poor performance and losing their people because they’re failing at recognition.
But with our latest report, Bridging the ROI Gap, uncovering that 67% of HR teams have experienced a budget cut in the last year, combatting the scrutiny that R&R programmes, amongst other employee engagement initiatives, are coming under will be a crucial requirement in 2026.
If you're building the business case for investing in employee recognition and reward or trying to justify your current budget, it can be hard to know where to start, or how hard you should be pushing. So, here are a few other employee recognition statistics, from our own research and from other sources to inspire you, or even include in your pitch:
The importance of recognition on talent attraction and retention
| 1 in 3 |
UK employees say that recognition and reward is a must-have from a potential new employer (The HR Priority Report, Reward Gateway | Edenred) |
| 29% |
of employees say they’d consider staying with their current employer if they received more recognition (The HR Priority Report, Reward Gateway | Edenred) |
| 27% |
of employees who considered leaving their job said it was due to a lack of recognition (The HR Priority Report, Reward Gateway | Edenred) |
Recognition as a driver of productivity and wellbeing
| 1 in 3 |
of UK employees say that their work wellbeing would improve if they were simply thanked more for their hard work. (The HR Priority Report, Reward Gateway | Edenred) |
| 38% |
of employees say receiving recognition and rewards makes them feel more productive at work (The HR Priority Report, Reward Gateway | Edenred) |
| 23% |
improvement on performance when employees are recognised effectively (The Appreciation Index, Reward Gateway | Edenred) |
Other recognition insights
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It’s estimated that global businesses lose approximately £7 trillion each year due to lack of motivation. |
Gallup, 2024 |
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Organisations where recognition occurs have 14% better employee engagement, productivity and customer service than those without. |
Bersin by Deloitte |
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Companies with a recognition culture have 31% lower employee turnover. |
Psychometrics |
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The magic number for recognition: It’s recommended to recognise an employee every seven days. |
Gallup |
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75% of employees receiving at least monthly recognition (even if informal) are satisfied with their job. |
BambooHR |
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Peer-to-peer recognition is 35.7% more likely to have a positive impact on financial results than manager-only recognition. |
SHRM |
Budget cuts and the ROI Gap
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67% of HR teams in the UK have had their budgets cut in the last year, with almost half (45%) of these seeing cuts of more than 10% (Bridging the ROI Gap, Reward Gateway | Edenred) |
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HR teams who struggle to prove ROI have had their budgets cut by twice as much (Bridging the ROI Gap, Reward Gateway | Edenred) |
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28% of these budgets cuts have been on R&R programmes (Bridging the ROI Gap, Reward Gateway | Edenred) |
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21% of HR are struggling to track and measure the ROI of reward and recognition schemes (Bridging the ROI Gap, Reward Gateway | Edenred) |
The business and cultural impact of recognition can't be understated, and the above statistics make it clear as to why. But despite this, HR are still having to fight to prove the value behind every initiative and draw clearer lines to its ROI.
To learn more about the current challenges facing HR teams and the growing need to bridge the ROI gap, download our full report below.
We hope this article has provided you with the statistics (and inspiration!) you need to build a stronger business case for R&R within your organisation.
Why not get in touch to speak to one of our employee engagement experts about driving engagement, productivity and business results through our digital reward and recognition solution?
