Achievers vs. O.C. Tanner: 2025 comparison guide for HR professionals

The most successful organizations recognize employees not just for tenure, but for everyday contributions that shape culture and results. In 2025, Achievers and O.C. Tanner are two of the best-known providers — but they take very different paths.

Achievers emphasizes continuous employee recognition, global scalability, and real-time employee insights while O.C. Tanner builds on its legacy of service awards and symbolic recognition. This guide compares both across rewards, engagement, integrations, analytics, and rollout — helping you choose the platform that aligns best with your workforce strategy.

At a glance: Achievers vs. O.C. Tanner

Here’s how Achievers and O.C. Tanner compare in a quick snapshot:

Achievers vs. O.C. Tanner overview

Achievers is a modern platform built to keep recognition frequent, global, and actionable. Its global rewards marketplace and Voice of Employee tools help HR leaders drive engagement and culture alignment every day. Recognition is embedded into daily tools like Teams, Slack, and Outlook, and supported by certified HRIS integrations including Workday, SAP SuccessFactors, and ADP.

O.C. Tanner is a pioneer in symbolic recognition, known for plaques, trophies, and milestone awards. It has expanded into digital recognition platforms but remains heavily tied to long-service and ceremonial recognition.

Key differences between Achievers & O.C. Tanner

Here’s how the two platforms are different in their approaches:

Rewards

Achievers centers its approach on a modern, flexible global rewards marketplace, where employees redeem points for gift cards, experiences, merchandise, or charitable donations — tailored to different regions. O.C. Tanner’s recognition model is rooted in symbolic awards and tenure-based gifts, emphasizing prestige and tradition over everyday choice and flexibility.

Feedback & engagement

Achievers takes engagement beyond recognition with Voice of Employee tools, enabling real-time surveys, pulses, and feedback loops tied directly to employee sentiment. O.C. Tanner connects engagement to recognition events like milestones and ceremonies, offering less in-the-moment listening and fewer continuous feedback opportunities for leaders and teams.

Integrations

Achievers integrates recognition seamlessly into daily collaboration tools like Microsoft Teams, Slack, and Outlook, while also offering the highest level of Workday integration and other HRIS connectors. O.C. Tanner integrates primarily with HRIS platforms such as Workday and SuccessFactors, with less emphasis on other day-to-day communication tools.

Manager enablement

Achievers equips managers with dashboards, alerts, and action planning tools that link recognition with employee sentiment and team health. This enables leaders to respond quickly and coach effectively. O.C. Tanner instead emphasizes milestone celebrations and symbolic recognition moments as its main support for leadership and managerial visibility.

Scale & rollout

Achievers provides modular deployment options, allowing organizations to scale recognition globally while adopting features at their own pace. This ensures faster implementation and higher adoption rates. O.C. Tanner rollouts are complex and less flexible for enterprises.

Global reach

Achievers supports multi-country recognition with currencies, languages, and compliance features built for enterprise use, alongside a diverse global rewards marketplace. O.C. Tanner maintains prestige in symbolic awards and milestone programs but offers fewer options for day-to-day recognition across international markets, making it less adaptable to distributed global workforces.

Recognition & rewards

Let’s move from the big picture to the specifics, exploring how Achievers and O.C. Tanner compare feature by feature.

Achievers

• Peer-to-peer recognition in Teams, Slack, Outlook
• Points, badges, and nominations reinforcing values
• Marketplace with 3M+ global options, including gift cards, experiences, merchandise, donations
• Configurable budgets, compliance, and approvals

O.C. Tanner

• Long-service and milestone awards
• Symbolic awards like plaques, trophies, pins
• Catalog of gifts tied to recognition events
• Recognition often centered on annual ceremonies

Employee surveys & feedback

Achievers

• Voice of Employee including surveys, pulses, polls
• Recognition data linked with employee sentiment
• Real-time insights for managers
• Integration with Achievers Workforce Institute (AWI) insights to benchmark engagement

O.C. Tanner

• Insights tied to recognition events
• More focus on storytelling and ceremonial recognition

Integrations & flow-of-work

Achievers

• Highest level Workday integration partnership
• Connectors for SAP SuccessFactors, ADP, Oracle, UKG, Ceridian
• Integration with Teams, Slack, Outlook
• API and SSO support

O.C. Tanner

• Integrations with Workday, SuccessFactors
• Outlook integration available
• Fewer day-to-day collaboration tools can be embedded

Analytics & governance

Achievers

• Dashboards for recognition usage and sentiment
• Employee voice analytics tied to survey data
• Permissions, roles, and compliance tools
• ROI calculator and reporting capabilities

O.C. Tanner

• Analytics tied to recognition and award events
• Focused on program activity and milestone adoption

Pricing

Achievers

• Custom pricing based on headcount, regions, and modules
• Contact Achievers for details

O.C. Tanner

• Pricing tied to headcount
• Contact O.C. Tanner for details

Pros & cons of Achievers vs. O.C. Tanner

Achievers

Pros

• Seamless integration with Teams, Slack, Outlook
• Modern, global rewards marketplace
• Certified HRIS integrations
• Modular rollout for scalability

Cons

• Less heritage in symbolic award

O.C. Tanner

Pros

• Focused on milestone and service awards
• Symbolic items may add prestige for long-time workers

Cons

• Narrower global catalog
• Limited real-time surveys and lightweight tools
• Less embedded in collaboration tools

Who should choose which?

Choose Achievers if…

• You want modern recognition in everyday tools
• You need a global rewards catalog
• You want real-time employee feedback and analytics
• You need scalable, modular rollout

Choose O.C. Tanner if…

• You prioritize service awards and symbolic recognition
• You value milestone celebrations and traditions
• You want to honor tenure with symbolic items
• You prefer program rollouts tied to ceremonies

Achievers vs O.C. Tanner: A clear choice

Both Achievers and O.C. Tanner excel in recognition, but their approaches are different. O.C. Tanner focuses on milestone awards and symbolic celebrations — ideal for organizations that prioritize heritage-driven recognition.

Achievers, however, is built for scale, agility, and impact. With global rewards, deep integrations, and manager enablement, Achievers ensures recognition isn’t just ceremonial — it’s every day, actionable, and measurable.

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