Indegene: Building passion, innovation, and collaboration with recognition

Indegene is driven to enable healthcare organizations to be future ready. This purpose inspires its people. A technology-led healthcare solutions provider with about 5,000 employees around the world, Indegene’s employees are at the heart of their business, innovation, and growth, and the company recently was honored as a Great Place to Work in India. An integral part of their culture is recognizing employees’ great work and empowering them to pursue the company’s core values: passion, innovation, and collaboration.

SITUATION

“Our values are so important to us. It’s the recognition for those values that’s most meaningful.”
—DR. SRIHARI S, DIRECTOR HUMAN RESOURCES                                    

When Indegene adopted new corporate values (Passion, Innovation, Collaboration), they needed a way to align recognition to those values. They wanted to encourage behaviors that demonstrated the new values and recognize instantaneously when employees practiced those behaviors. Since what is recognized is sustained, recognition plays an important part in integrating the values into their company culture.

Dr. Srihari S, Director Human Resources, gathered a team to search for a recognition solution that could directly connect employees’ contributions to their new values in real-time. After evaluating various recognition providers, they chose to partner with O.C. Tanner.

O.C. Tanner’s technology was easy to use and provided a clear nomination and approval process. Recognition could be shared across the organization through a social wall and on social media. But most importantly, there were well-defined categories of award levels and values to tie recognition to, and dashboards available for the company to track recognition usage and see which values were recognized most. And O.C. Tanner’s exceptional customer service and customization allowed Indegene to design a program that reflected their culture and values.

With this new partnership, Indegene created the Aspire program.

SOLUTION

Aspire is an innovative program that allows employees to instantly give recognition and share employee contributions and successes across the organization. “You’re doing it at the right moment. You don’t have to wait until the end of the month, so employees are happy and are immediately motivated,” says Dr. Geetha, Senior Manager, Medical Writing Team.

“We have employees located all over the globe. They are able to use Aspire with ease,” explains Ayesha Khyser, HR Business Partner.

Categories for recognition are linked to the company’s values and because they are pre-defined it is easy to connect the recognition to a specific value. The platform is easily accessible, simple to use, and makes it very clear what should be recognized and what level of award is appropriate. As a result, employees now know the company’s values well and what behaviors reinforce each value.

The new program was launched with a communications plan and training for business unit partners. There are ongoing campaigns, like Manager Appreciation Week, to encourage employees to recognize through the program. Indegene regularly updates and makes enhancements, like the recent addition of employee tenure awards, to ensure Aspire continues to be best-in-class as the company evolves.

SHARING SUCCESS AND INSPIRATION ACROSS THE COMPANY

Dr. Srihari and his team used API integrations to ensure Aspire was embedded throughout the company. They stream real-time recognition as it’s being given onto television screens in the reception areas of all of their offices across the globe. When potential candidates, business partners, and clients come to an Indegene office, they see the great work employees are doing across the organization.

The recognition feed is also featured prominently on the homepage of their intranet and is linked to the Aspire program where employees can learn about the program or give recognition to a peer.

The team customized the platform to give Aspire a brand and added a “Citation Library”—a compilation of templates for recognition descriptions that managers can be inspired by and customize for their own recognition submissions. Managers can use these examples and add their own messages.

Seeing recognition being shared across the globe, in real-time, has helped communicate the company values and instilled a sense of pride in employees. The constant reminders of the great work people are doing ensure passion, innovation, and collaboration are practiced, and recognized, every day.

“It’s about thanking employees for the efforts they put in for us; for the outcomes they achieve, for the business impact they drive. That’s the most important reason we do recognition. It’s our way of giving back to our employees—it’s our philosophy at Indegene.”
—DR. SRIHARI S, DIRECTOR, HUMAN RESOURCES                                    

INSTILLING PRIDE, REINFORCING VALUES, AND SEEING RESULTS

Aspire has seen great success with 85% of employees accessing the program. It has helped Indegene reach an overall happiness score of 75%.

Employees are thrilled with the recognition experience the program provides, and managers can now easily and quickly share employee accomplishments. Aspire has made recognition more visible and helped Indegene achieve a major company milestone – quickly instilling the new values in employees. The most recent employee survey shows 78% of employees are satisfied with recognition and collaboration at the company, which increased 3% from last year despite the pandemic.

“Aspire is a great way to remind people of our organization’s values and what we believe, and when you start recognizing people for those values it definitely helps in building the culture we want,” says Seema Prabhu, HR Business Partner.

Employees feel a great deal of pride when their names and photos are featured on the Leader Board and Wall of Fame and are motivated to continue to do great work and innovate. Sharing recognition across the company builds camaraderie with colleagues while also inspiring others to perform at a higher level.

“It boosts employee morale. They work a little harder. At the end of the day, everyone seeks recognition for the work they are doing, ” says Arun Kumar, Senior User Experience Designer. “If their work is getting recognized, they feel they are part of the team, and they tend to give more. It builds a positive competitive environment.”

Passion. Innovation. Collaboration. The Aspire program reflects Indegene’s company values and culture and contributes to making Indegene a Great Place to Work.

“We are very passionate about we do. Our team members are very passionate about what they do. And this is our way to say thank you. That’s the beauty of our company,” says Dr. Srihari.

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