Kudos is about recognition and gratefulness. It makes sense to implement a kudos system as an isolated action: it’s so easy and so powerful! But you could also ponder if there is a way to use a kudos system as a seed for a broader recognition strategy.

Kudos? What’s kudos?

Want a short definition? ‘Thanks, praise, props‘

Want a long one? ‘Kudos is admiration or recognition that someone or something gets as a result of a particular action or achievement.’, according to Collins

How to implement the kudos system?

So, finally. You can send or give kudos by email, in public, with a phone call, even with a graffiti.

But we are looking for something systematic for our team/company, right? It is better if there is a shared method so that kudos are traceable, searchable, why not… linkable so that you can refer to them to praise or acknowledge the good work someone made. And even something that could be potentially integrated with other systems. But the most important aspect here is that the kudos system MUST be a horizontal system. Kudos are given between peers, or people that act as a peer when they are sending kudos (this is a general rule for any kind of recognition and gratefulness policy).

There are lots of possibilities, some paid, some for free. Some more sophisticated, some more simple… You can google a bit, and anything allowing you to store, find and link kudos is potentially a good system/app (one example? https://www.kudosnow.com/).

Limit per period vs kudos deflation

Sidenote. No matter the implementation you finally decide, I’d recommend setting a limit for kudos given in a period. This would give more value to the sending kudos action. If you can just send 3 kudos a month, you need to decide who deserves these kudos the most. However, if there are no limits, you would be picking the value out from the action, causing a kudos deflation.

My choice. A p2 themed blog.

My gut feeling is “the simpler the better”. So my preferred implementation is a blog in which a post is a kudos where you mention the person you are giving praise to, you explain why and it is stored, linkable and also interfaceable with other systems. Horizontality? Yeah. Anyone in the company should be able to post here.

Interfaceable? Well, if you have a WordPress blog, it’s pretty easy for a developer to implement some cool integrations:

• Add these kudos to that personal profile. Side note, the kudos count is one of the first things I read when looking for information on someone in my company directory.
• By counting kudos, you can establish any kind of rewards or recognition based on kudos
• Being able to send kudos from a form, that could be everywhere or on every device. You could even integrate this kudos sending into Slack or any other application.
• If you have a p2 post, any taker can answer to the giver of the kudos. Also reasons for the kudos can be linked in the kudos post.
• …

And that would be all. Say thanks, send kudos no matter the format and send them often!