How a distributed engineering team brought recognition into Microsoft Teams

The challenge

Recognition existed, but it lived outside the workflow

A distributed engineering team spanning the US and India faced a familiar adoption problem. The recognition platform worked, but it sat in a separate tab from where engineers actually spent their day. Getting people to open a new app to send a thank-you note created enough friction that recognition stayed occasional rather than habitual.

For an engineering workforce coordinating across time zones, every extra click mattered. The People team needed recognition to live inside the tool the team was already using all day, not bolted on beside it.

The solution

Recognition inside the tool engineers never leave

The company integrated Xoxoday Empuls directly into Microsoft Teams. Recognition, rewards, and milestone celebrations now happen natively inside Teams channels and chats, removing the step of switching tools entirely.

• Peer and manager recognition sent directly from a Teams channel or chat
• Milestone automation for work anniversaries, with no manual tracking
• A connected rewards marketplace for point redemption, accessible without leaving Teams
• A year-over-year view across monthly active users, recognitions, wishes, and total activity

The results

Engagement doubled across every metric that mattered

Measured across a full year of program data, every engagement metric moved in the same direction. Recognitions more than doubled, active users grew by nearly two-thirds, and total platform activity more than doubled. That consistency across metrics points to a broad shift in behavior, not a gain confined to one feature.