Scotiabank’s Applause 2.0: Powering 1M+ recognitions annually

Founded in 1832 in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Scotiabank, is a leading bank in Canada and a leading financial services provider in the Americas, with over 23 million customers, assets of approximately $1.2 trillion (as of January 31, 2022), and approximately 90,000 employees across 30 countries.

Achievers powers Scotiabank’s recognition program, Applause 2.0. Before partnering with Achievers, Scotiabank was running a legacy recognition platform that was not meeting their needs: the technology was antiquated, there was no opportunity for cross-team recognition, recognitions were private, there was no mobile app, and the analytics and reporting were poor. In Achievers, Scotiabank found the technology they were seeking to level up their global recognition program.

Achievers Employee Experience Platform

Applause 2.0 leverages Achievers advanced HR technology that enables ongoing employee recognition at all levels, linking to the company’s mission pillars and core values: Customer First, Winning Team, Lead in the Americas, Keeping the Bank Safe, Respect, Integrity, Passion, and Accountability. Applause 2.0 is the only centralized, enterprise-wide platform within Scotiabank that all employees across the world can access. With the ability to earn points through point-based recognitions, employees can work towards redeeming from a wide variety of reward items in the catalogue no matter where they are in the world.

Armed with data from their own employee surveys indicating that manager recognition is most impactful, Scotiabank elected to initially focus on manager recognition. Leveraging tools like Achievers’ Manager Digest and regular budget reminders, Scotiabank successfully mobilized their leaders to be recognition advocates. As their program matured, Scotiabank came up with creative ways to drive individual contributor peer-to-peer recognition as well, with annual initiatives like their Pay It Forward campaign. This type of campaign proved incredibly effective for maintaining program momentum: one of their more successful Pay It Forward campaigns generated a 40% increase in active users over the previous month.

In addition to leveraging campaigns to promote recognition, Scotiabank also understands the importance of incorporating recognition into the flow of work. Most recently, Scotiabank rolled out the Achievers integration with Microsoft Teams, which allows for seamless recognition within the popular collaboration platform. Enabling the Achievers for Teams integration allows Scotiabank employees to instantly send and receive recognitions without ever leaving Teams — increasing the visibility of good work and encouraging timely and frequent recognition while building a culture of engagement.

Employees at Scotiabank have been quick to leverage this new channel for recognition – in the first month since launch, Scotiabank has already seen approximately 10% of their recognitions flow through Teams. Beyond leveraging Applause 2.0 for recognition, Scotiabank has integrated other key programs including their annual performance-based Best of the Best awards and their Years of Service program called “Tributes”. Scotiabank also uses Achievers’ Custom Celebration Cards, providing their employees with an easy way to celebrate virtually both life and professional milestones with a memorable digital card.

Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Spotlight

The Achievers Workforce Institute Culture Report on Belonging at Work found that employees with a strong sense of belonging are twice as likely to be engaged, productive, committed, and resilient. Recognizing the importance of fostering a culture of belonging, Scotiabank has been able to leverage Applause 2.0 to support their Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) strategy. Within Applause 2.0, Scotiabank added a specific recognition category to promote behaviors associated with Allyship. Having this dedicated Allyship category allowed employees to recognize their peers for behaviors that help create an inclusive workplace.

Scotiabank has also refreshed their recognition image gallery to include images and symbols that align with their DEI values.

Scotiabank has also realized the potential of leveraging Applause 2.0 for corporate social responsibility initiatives. At the onset of the Russia-Ukraine war, Scotiabank committed more than $1 million towards supporting Ukraine humanitarian and resettlement efforts. Through Applause 2.0, Scotiabank employees were also able to donate their points to a number of charities providing humanitarian relief to the Ukraine.

The Ukraine Give Back campaign provided a way for Scotiabank’s employees around the globe to quickly and easily support Ukraine relief efforts directly from Applause 2.0.

Engaging a global employee population through recognition

The response to Applause 2.0 has been overwhelmingly positive across all employee populations at Scotiabank, from senior leaders and managers to individual contributors. As the only program that touches Scotiabank’s full global population, employees appreciate the social aspect of Applause 2.0 – being able to like and comment on their team members’ achievements, no matter the location.

The enthusiasm Scotiabank’s employees have for Applause 2.0 is evidenced in their metrics: since launching the Achievers Employee Success Platform, Scotiabank has seen a steady increase in recognition activity with 93% of their ~90,000 employees utilizing the platform regularly. Comparing recognition activity today versus the first year after launch shows the average number of recognitions sent per employee has increased by almost 60%.

Scotiabank has also succeeded in motivating manager recognition with 99% of people leaders activated in the program. Managers at Scotiabank send an average of 3 recognitions per month – nearly double the average amount of recognitions managers were sending the first year after launching Achievers. This sustained growth in manager recognition shows that recognition has become a habit for managers at Scotiabank, consistently reinforcing that culture of engagement.

The results of Scotiabank’s annual engagement survey reflect the positive impact of Applause 2.0. Comparing recognition activity with engagement scores appears to show a correlation between managers who are sending more recognition and engagement scores in those areas. The data suggests that the more you send recognition, the more engaged you feel at work.

What’s next?

To support the evolution of Applause 2.0 into an even more robust employee engagement hub, Scotiabank is actively looking to add other Achievers products like Employee Connections, which would help Scotiabank create opportunities for employees to connect across job levels and build a strong sense of belonging in the workplace. Employee Connections works by pairing employees, who normally would not interact, to meet virtually or inperson to get to know one another and their roles in the company – a feature that is especially attractive to Scotiabank with their large and diverse employee population.

With a partnership that has extended for many years, Achievers has supported Scotiabank through myriad shifts in work, including the COVID 19 pandemic. With the strength of Applause 2.0 and wellbeing of their employees top of mind, Scotiabank will continue to prioritize recognition as a means of engaging their global employees.