How to Recognize Your Team: Employee Appreciation Questionnaire Templates

There’s oodles of advice online about employee appreciation and how to show your team that you care (we’ve even written some of it). But here’s the truth: The best way to appreciate your employees isn’t with the most popular tactic on Google. It’s by finding out how they want to be appreciated—and doing that. Luckily, you can learn those things pretty easily by sending out a “How Do You Like to be Recognized at Work?” questionnaire (aka an employee recognition questionnaire or employee recognition survey). 

What is an Employee Recognition Questionnaire?

An employee recognition questionnaire is a survey that HR professionals or office managers send out to their teams. Essentially, it asks the question: “How do you like to be recognized at work?” After sending out the survey you can analyze the data to create an employee recognition system that will boost employee happiness and wellbeing in your workplace.

How to Use an Employee Recognition Questionnaire

Start With a Template

We recommend splitting your “How Do You Like to be Recognized at Work?” questionnaire into four sections: Important Dates, Favorites, Recognition History, and Recognition Preferences. You can find two questionnaire templates—one for current employees and one for new hires—below to help you get started. Feel free to use the templates as-is, or customize them to fit your company.

Choose Your Survey Method

You can send your questionnaire virtually using a program like Google Forms, SurveyMonkey, or Typeform. This is a great option for remote or hybrid teams. If your entire team works in the office, you can go old-school and print your survey. 

Reach Out to Everyone

Ask your entire team to fill out a version of the questionnaire, from senior leadership to brand-new hires. The bigger your sample size is, the more accurate your data will be. You can also review your results by department or experience level to gain more specific insights into your team’s recognition preferences. Odds are that C-suite executives and entry-level workers will have different priorities when it comes to rewards and recognition. 

Send Reminders

Even engaged workers need multiple reminders to do things that are outside of their usual workflows, like fill out surveys. Plan to send out multiple reminder emails, Slack/Teams messages, and even check in with employees in person to get the results you need. 

It would be ideal to get a 100% response rate, but as football coach Vince Lombardi once said, “Perfection is not attainable, but if we chase perfection we can catch excellence.” The employee survey platform People Insight claims that “a good rule of thumb is that anything over 70% is good, over 80% is great, and 90% is exceptional.” 

Here at The FruitGuys, our leadership team reminded employees a dozen times to take our most recent team survey and gave them a month to complete it. We ultimately had a response rate of 87%.

Use Your Results to Take Action

Once your results are in, don’t let them linger in a drawer or digital file. Instead, use what you’ve learned to create an employee recognition program that reflects your team’s goals and preferences. You may also want to share your key takeaways from the survey with your team and explain your next steps to them. 

The FruitGuys is extremely transparent about survey results. Our leadership team shares the data anonymously in team meetings and explains how the company will take action to improve. As a general rule, the more quickly and thoughtfully you act on your team’s feedback, the more valued and heard they’ll feel. 

If you’re not sure how to start planning your program, check out this list of seven times throughout the year to give employee appreciation gifts and compare it with your survey results. 

When to Use an Employee Recognition Questionnaire

If you’ve never sent out a “How Do You Like to be Recognized at Work?” questionnaire before, there’s no time like the present. Share one version of the survey with current employees now and another with new hires as part of the onboarding process. From there, make a plan to gather new data regularly. 

Asking employees to take the survey again at regular intervals will help you keep an eye on their shifting preferences. The employer certification platform Great Place to Work recommends surveying employees at least once a year. However, if your team can tell that you’re taking their feedback seriously and acting on it, you can send out surveys more often without pushback. 

‘How Do You Like to be Recognized at Work?’ Questionnaire Templates

These templates include examples of effective employee recognition survey questions and suggestions for how to customize them. We’ve included two templates, one for new hires and one for current employees. 

Employee Recognition Survey Template for New Hires (15 Questions)

Important Dates

1. When was your first day at [company name]?
2. When is your birthday?

Favorites

1. What is your favorite color? 
2. What is your favorite healthy snack?
3. What is your favorite sweet treat?
4. What is your go-to coffee shop order?
5. What hobbies/activities do you enjoy outside of work?
6. Do you have any allergies or dietary restrictions?

Recognition Preferences

1. How often would you like to receive feedback on your performance from your manager?
2. When would you most like to be recognized by your manager (choose three)?*
3. What type of recognition would you value the most?**
4. What type of award would you value the most?**
5. How important is recognition to you, on a scale of 1–10, with 10 being extremely important?
6. Are you comfortable being recognized in public (ex. with a shoutout during a team meeting) or would you prefer private recognition?
7. Is there anything else we should know about how you like to be recognized at work? 

*For this question, provide a multiple-choice list of times your company is prepared to offer recognition, like work anniversaries, birthdays, successful project completions, reaching team goals, above-and-beyond contributions, meeting key objectives for a set amount of time, etc.

**For these questions, provide a multiple-choice list of recognition/awards your company is prepared to offer, like verbal or written thank-yous, gifts related to the employee’s hobbies/interests as tokens of thanks, tickets to experiences, PTO, bonuses/monetary gifts, promotions, connections with mentors, continuing education, etc.

Employee Recognition Survey Template for Current Employees (20 Questions)

Important Dates

1. When was your first day at [company name]?
2. When is your birthday?

Favorites

1. What is your favorite color? 
2. What is your favorite healthy snack?
3. What is your favorite sweet treat?
4. What is your go-to coffee shop order?
5. What hobbies/activities do you enjoy outside of work?
6. Do you have any allergies or dietary restrictions?

Recognition History

1. How often do you receive positive feedback from your manager?
2. How often do you receive positive feedback from your coworkers?
3. How often do you give positive feedback to your coworkers?
4. Would you like to be recognized more often? If so, how often? 
5. On a scale of 1–10 how valued and appreciated do you feel at work, with 10 being extremely valued?

Recognition Preferences

1. How often would you like to receive feedback on your performance from your manager?
2. When would you most like to be recognized by your manager (choose three)?*
3. What type of recognition would you value the most?**
4. What type of award would you value the most?**
5. On a scale of 1–10 how important is recognition to you, with 10 being extremely important?
6. Are you comfortable being recognized in public (e.g. with a shoutout during a team meeting) or would you prefer private recognition?
7. Is there anything else we should know about how you like to be recognized at work? 

*For this question, provide a multiple-choice list of times your company is prepared to offer recognition, like work anniversaries, birthdays, successful project completions, reaching team goals, above-and-beyond contributions, meeting key objectives for a set amount of time, etc.

**For these questions, provide a multiple-choice list of recognition/awards your company is prepared to offer, like verbal or written thank-yous, gifts related to the employee’s hobbies/interests as tokens of thanks, tickets to experiences, company swag, PTO, bonuses/monetary gifts, promotions, connections with mentors, continuing education, etc.

Employee Recognition Questionnaire FAQs

1. Do I need to ask all of the questions in the “How Do You Like to be Recognized at Work?” questionnaire template? 

Nope! Each template is just a suggestion—feel free to remove questions, add questions, or adjust questions to fit your team and situation. For example, if you already have an employee recognition program in place, you might want to ask employees how they feel about specific awards that you offer to find out if they’re effective or need adjustments. 

2. How often should I send out an employee recognition questionnaire? 

It’s best practice to survey new hires during onboarding and current employees at least once a year, just in case their preferences change. 

3. Why is sending out an employee recognition questionnaire important? 

Employees who feel recognized and appreciated at work also feel less stressed and burnt out than employees who don’t. They perform better, and they’re happier with their jobs, too. Sending out an employee recognition questionnaire and taking action on the results can help you unlock these benefits in your workplace and improve employee wellbeing and retention. Learn more about why employee appreciation is important here.