Page 6 - Experiential Magazine - Vol 6

PROFILE

Rideau Focuses on Bringing ROI
to Recognition and Engagement

The company believes it can continue to grow by providing ‘real recognition, real value, and real results.’

Rideau is attempting to disrupt won’t happen.” He asserts that of buying programs that don’t The Vistance recognition plat-
the current concept of recogni- companies who pay suppliers up render return on recognition.” form prescribes to the manager
tion by focusing on providing front for points and award vouch- specific learning programs or
what CEO Peter Hart describes ers need to protect their invest- Hart notes: “At Rideau, our goal modules to address the areas that
as, “Real recognition with real ment by including restricted-use is to bring our clients the highest require further improvement.
reward value that is linked to and audit clauses in contracts so level of service through analytics, The manager’s RQ Score is then
our clients’ key performance that the funds are strictly des- actionable insights and prescrip- re-measured to evaluate whether
indicators (KPIs) – in short, tined to be used only to operate tive learning. Unless you’ve done the issues have been addressed.
Rideau aims to provide return the program(s). Rideau embraces the hard research and conducted
on recognition.” Hart asserts the practice of and champions the trials to understand what “The goal is to help a manager
that the majority of recognition accountability for such programs. happens over time, you can’t un- improve his or her RQ Score,”
suppliers focus on finding ways derstand how to properly select Hart explains. “The Vistance
to sell more rewards, gift cards, The First Standard which programs and rewards to recognition platform guides the
vouchers, etc., and to increase use. If anyone tells you otherwise, manager as it provides prescrip-
their profits from breakage One of the critical elements to they haven’t analyzed the data.” tive learning modules to help him
(unredeemed points or vouchers), Rideau’s competitive strategy is or her to improve. The ultimate
than they do on actually helping program design to ensure that The Vistance Platform proof of success is when the RQ
clients achieve key organization- the recognition effort promotes Score increases and we see a cor-
al results through recognition. the necessary behaviors to To support Rideau’s analytics and responding improvement in both
achieve key organizational goals. learning approach to recogni- the engagement and the client’s
Rideau defines real reward “I don’t think there’s enough tion, the company launched its other KPIs.”
value as having a transparent understanding of the redemption Vistance recognition platform,
pricing model that protects the models in the marketplace,” Hart which enables organizations to Reflecting the addition of ser-
client. Hart explains: “When says. “If you look at Recognition run multiple types of recognition vices to its recognition product
programs are based on breakage, Professionals International’s programs for different purpos- line, Rideau renamed its Rec-
the question becomes, who gets Seven Best Practice Standards, es; regularly track the level of ognition Management Institute
the benefit of that breakage? In you’ll see that the first standard employee engagement through thought leadership unit the
many cases, this goes 100% to is to have a written strategy. The Recognition Pulse surveys and “Vistance Institute” to reflect the
the supplier, when we think that last survey we saw showed that, engagement with the program; areas of expertise surrounding
breakage should be shared. Of at best, about half of organiza- and score managers based on its Vistance product line. The
course, the supplier should be tions have such a strategy. There the level of engagement of their product lines include corporate
paid for the technology platform should also be management team(s). The RQ (Recognition leadership, culture change,
and services they provide. But responsibility, program mea- Quotient), functions like the coaching, assessment and other
why should all the breakage go to surement, communication plan, FICO credit scale for consumers tools provided in some cases
the supplier when people should training, events and celebrations, in that it scores numerically: 1) through industry partners to help
be redeeming their points? In and finally program change and how well the manager recognizes clients achieve the best results
effect, with that model, a client flexibility. This general lack of and appreciates his or her team(s) from their recognition invest-
is paying a supplier upfront for knowledge about program design and 2) identifies specific areas in ment.
something the supplier hopes helps to explain why so many which a manager is successful or
organizations make the mistake requires further improvement.

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