Episode #11: Why recognition is the fuel that will power your team through the ERP marathon
Discover why recognition is your program’s "immune system" and how to operationalise it to sustain performance
The "Marathon" Risk: Why Recognition is Your ERP Program’s Immune System
Most ERP programs are scoped for three, four, or even five years. That’s not just a project; that is a significant portion of your team's career. While we obsess over the technical critical path – integrations, data loads, and code freezes – we often neglect the "energy critical path." When timelines stretch this long, the primary risk isn't just technical failure; it's human burnout. Recognition in this context is not "soft HR stuff"; it's a strategic performance lever that sustains delivery capacity when the pressure mounts.
This article examines why recognition is the "immune system" of complex, multi-year transformations. We analyse the dangerous "Rush & Drop" pattern that erodes team resilience between stage gates and why generic rewards often fail to land. You will learn how to operationalise recognition through consistent central rituals, empower Stream Leads as daily multipliers, and fund local celebrations to protect your program's internal reputation and delivery speed.
The "Rush & Drop" Trap in Long-Haul Programs
ERP programs are marathons. Yet, most program governance is designed as a series of breathless sprints. A stage gate closes, and the next phase begins immediately.
In this environment, recognition often becomes the first casualty. We see a recurring pattern we call the "Rush & Drop." The team pushes hard to hit a milestone, the deadline passes, and instead of a moment of acknowledgment, the focus shifts instantly to the next crisis.
The impact of this isn't immediate. It shows up months later – during User Acceptance Testing (UAT), cutover, or the turbulent weeks of hypercare. This is when you need your team to be most resilient, but because their "emotional fuel" was depleted months ago, they have nothing left to give. This early drop in engagement is often the quiet beginning of later adoption challenges.
Recognition as the Program’s Immune System
We describe recognition as the immune system of a transformation.
Every program faces setbacks. Deadlines slip, the business pushes back, and technical integrations fail. When these external stressors hit, a well-recognised team has the resilience to absorb the shock and keep moving. A team that feels treated like "resources" rather than partners will disengage or churn.
The research is clear: People maintain effort in demanding, long-duration work far better when they feel their contribution is seen and valued.
Operationalising Recognition: A Framework for CIOs
You can’t rely on recognition happening "accidentally." It must be designed into your operating model with the same rigor as your testing cycles.
1. Design the Rhythm Don't wait for the year-end Christmas party to celebrate achievements. Build recognition into the moments that matter: sprint completions, successful testing waves, and data migration sign-offs. If it's not on the agenda, urgency will kill it.
2. Institutionalise Central Visibility Visibility is currency. While spot bonuses are nice, giving a talented junior developer or a dedicated tester a platform is often far more powerful. We recommend institutionalising this in your All-Hands meetings. Dedicate a permanent 15-minute slot to "Recognition."
The Mechanism: Pre-ask your leadership team for nominations of people who went "above and beyond."
The Execution: The leader who nominated them tells the story publicly. They explain exactly what the person did and how it reflects the program’s values. Follow the golden rule: Criticise in private, celebrate in public. Giving a junior team member "on the ground" visibility in front of the entire global program creates a level of loyalty that money can't buy.
3. Demand Leadership Accountability from Stream Leads Central formats are powerful, but they can't catch everything. You can't see every late-night fix or every moment of peer support in the daily grind. This is where your Stream Leads come in. Make it clear that recognition is a core leadership task, not a "nice-to-have" add-on. They're the multipliers who catch the small, critical wins that keep the engine running. We recommend including a specific question in your monthly team pulse check: "I feel recognised and appreciated by my local program leadership." This creates accountability and signals to your leads that you're watching the "energy metric" as closely as the "budget metric".
4. Orchestrate Locally, Fund Locally For major milestones, you define the What (the achievement) but let the countries define the How (the celebration). Designing a "Moment of Celebration" centrally ensures alignment, but a generic email from HQ won't energise a local team in India or Brazil. Give your Local Leads the autonomy – and the budget – to run local gatherings or short celebrations. A small budget allocated for a team lunch or an on-site event following a successful UAT phase is an incredibly high-ROI investment in morale.
Key Takeaways for IT Leaders
Recognition is Risk Management. It protects your delivery capacity. A burned-out team can't deliver a successful cutover.
Visibility is Currency. Institutionalise public recognition in your All-Hands. Let leaders tell the stories of the heroes "on the ground."
Don't rely on HR. Make daily recognition a mandatory leadership KPI for your Stream Leads.
Avoid the "Rush & Drop." Deliberately pause after milestones to acknowledge the effort before launching the next phase.
Fund the Fun. Provide a dedicated local budget for celebrations. You can't expect local teams to build culture on zero resources.
About your host
Arne Kötting founded COSYN after years of seeing organisations struggle with the human side of tech change. He built the Change Playbook to codify what actually works based on 20 years of watching these patterns.
The Change Playbook is designed for IT program teams to confidently manage the human side of tech change in-house, without expensive consulting dependencies.
His conversational style cuts through complexity to reveal the fundamental principles that make tech change communication work - principles you can apply 1:1 to your own transformation challenges.
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