Award categories

Team Categories

1. Excellence in Career Development

This award recognises an organisation that demonstrated excellence in implementing strategic plans to address and drive organisational transformation. Entrants should showcase how their HR teams exhibited vision, agility, and effectiveness in executing transformative change initiatives aligned with the business objectives. Judges will look for how the change journey empowered employees to make the significant transition, embrace the new vision, while delivering positive transformative impacts.

2. Excellence in Change Leadership Strategy

This award recognises an organisation that demonstrated excellence in implementing strategic plans to address and drive organisational transformation. Entrants should showcase how their HR teams contributed to the redesign of key processes aligned with the business objectives, thus strengthening the organisation’s growth. Judges will look for how the transformation projects empowered employees to embrace the new vision while minimising any potential negative impacts.

3. Excellence in Compensation & Benefits

This award recognises an organisation that applied a practical and innovative compensation and benefits scheme to attract, retain, and engage employees. Entrants should show how the overall HR strategic plan satisfied the employees while staying in control of the budget. Judges will look at how the C&B strategy aligned with the employee value proposition and met the overall business goals.

4. Excellence in Diversity, Equity & Inclusion

This award recognises an organisation that fostered a diverse workforce that provided a diverse, equitable, and inclusive workplace. Entrants should show how their best diversity, equity, and inclusion strategies were embedded within the organisational culture, HR policies, and procedures. Judges will look for action-oriented approaches that ensured a level of transparency, and removed any unfair bias, along with any measurable evidence of the initiatives’ effect on the growth and sustainability of the organisation.

5. Excellence in Employee Care & Wellbeing

This award recognises an organisation that demonstrated a strong commitment to prioritising the health, safety, and overall wellbeing of its employees by implementing comprehensive policies and programmes that addressed physical, mental, and emotional health, and prioritised work-life balance. Judges will look for companies that went above and beyond to create a supportive workplace culture that fostered employee development, engagement, and satisfaction. Entrants should demonstrate their genuine commitment to the care and wellbeing of their employees, resulting in a highly engaged and motivated workforce.

6. Excellence in Employee Development

This award recognises an organisation that had a clear and personalised ongoing development plan for individual employees – from training to career development. Entrants should show how the HR programmes and policies promoted a clear vision of employee development and encouraged employees and managers to proactively participate in on-the-job trainings, coaching, mentoring, and other initiatives designed to improve employee skills and knowledge. Judges will look at how the HR strategies and programmes provided a supportive workplace culture that encouraged ongoing learning and development, and enhanced the personal growth of employees.

7. Excellence in Employee Engagement

This award recognises an organisation that had an effective employee engagement strategy which was aligned with its wider business objectives, and benefited the organisation’s growth and employees’ motivations, resulting in increased job satisfaction, productivity, and retention. Entrants should show specific engagement initiatives that understood employee needs, and supported their commitment and satisfaction at work. Judges will look for high-level engagement initiatives that increased the productivity of the organisation’s overall performance.

8. Excellence in Employee Volunteerism (New)

This award recognises an organisation that implemented effective strategies to encourage and support employee volunteerism, resulting in positive outcomes for both the organisation and its community. Entrants should demonstrate the commitment to social impact and employee empowerment, and the initiatives that prioritised volunteerism and community engagement.

9. Excellence in Employer Branding

This award recognises an organisation with a unique value proposition and highly identifiable branding that created value to the organisation. Entrants should show how a strong branding campaign helped in employee recruitment, retention, and engagement. Judges will look for how the campaign promoted the employer brand, growth of the brand, and the sustainability of the organisation.

10. Excellence in ESG Strategy

This award recognises companies who successfully integrated sustainable and responsible practices into their HR operations. Entrants should showcase how their HR strategies aligned with environmental stewardship, social responsibility, and strong corporate governance practices, resulting in long-term value creation for all stakeholders. Judges will look at the company’s approach to integrating ESG (environmental, social, and governance) considerations into its HR practices which enhanced its reputation, and created a better world for all parties. Winners should have a clear and comprehensive ESG strategy that resulted in tangible benefits for the organisation and society at large.

11. Excellence in Graduate & Management Trainee Programme

This award recognises an organisation that had an exceptional recruitment and development programme for fresh graduates or early-stage professionals. Entrants should show how their HR strategies attracted and developed new talent to the organisation and supported core business strategies, while enabling graduates and trainees to develop key skills, knowledge, and competencies required for success in their roles. Judges will look at the effectiveness of the organisation’s graduate and management trainee programmes in supporting workforce planning, improving individual performance, and driving overall business success.

12. Excellence in HR Change Management (New)

This award recognises excellence in an organisation’s ability to plan, execute, and manage the transformation process of a business project. Entries should show how HR contributed to all the main redesigned processes that were aligned to the business objective, and how they strengthened the organisation’s growth. Judges will look for how the transformation projects empowered employees to be receptive to the new vision, while minimising any potential negative impacts.

13. Excellence in HR Communication Strategy (New)

This award recognises an organisation that implemented effective communication strategies internally, resulting in elevated levels of employee engagement, productivity, and retention. The winner will have demonstrated a clear understanding of the employee needs and preferences, and have implemented initiatives that prioritised a seamless communication and the employee voice.

14. Excellence in HR Digital Transformation

This award recognises an organisation that wholeheartedly embraced the digital revolution with campaigns to speed up HR innovations and improve synergies across teams. Entrants should show their HR investments in digitalisation and their impact on enriching the employee experience, and supporting the wider strategy of the organisation. Judges will look for HR digital initiatives that have helped to evolve a digital culture and contributed to the bottom line of the organisation.

15. Excellence in HR Innovation (New)

This award recognises an organisation that demonstrated a commitment to innovation within its HR function, resulting in improved organisational performance and success. Entrants should showcase how they implemented effective HR innovation strategies, demonstrated a clear understanding of emerging technologies and trends, and prioritised ongoing learning and development.

16. Excellence in Internship Recruitment/Development (New)

This award recognises an organisation that implemented an outstanding internship programme focused on attracting, engaging, and developing early-career talent. Entrants should demonstrate how their internship initiatives provided valuable hands-on learning experiences that helped interns build practical skills, gain industry knowledge, and grow professionally. The internship programme should also have aligned with the organisation’s values and talent goals, while offering interns meaningful exposure to real-world projects and mentoring. Judges will look for evidence of a supportive learning environment, intern satisfaction, and how the programme contributed to future talent pipelines within the organisation.

17. Excellence in Learning & Development

This award recognises an organisation that implemented an effective learning and development programme that exceeded its business objectives and contributed to its bottom line. Entrants should show a state-of-the-art programme that strengthened individual and organisational performance, and promoted a culture of continuous L&D in the organisation, while providing an engaging and effective learning environment that fostered employee growth and development. Judges will look at the design, creation, and implementation of a specific learning and development strategy that effectively hit organisational targets and contributed to the organisation’s bottom line.

18. Excellence in Retention Strategy

This award recognises an organisation that excelled in its retention strategies and created a positive work environment that prioritised employee satisfaction and engagement by offering competitive compensation and benefits packages, opportunities for career growth and development, and fostered a culture of collaboration and teamwork. A happy and fulfilled workforce is more likely to stay with a company long term; and companies that prioritise retention strategies are able to reduce employee turnover rates, retain top talent, and maintain a competitive advantage in their industry. Judges will be looking for companies that went beyond the traditional ways of retention, and instead, used data-driven insights to identify and address factors that impact employee turnover rates.

19. Excellence in Talent Acquisition

This award recognises an organisation that implemented innovative and effective strategies to identify, attract, and hire top talent. Companies who prioritised talent acquisition by attracting top talent, building a strong employer brand, and staying ahead of the competition in today’s competitive job market. Judges will look for companies that had a deep understanding of their talent needs, used data-driven insights to develop targeted recruitment campaigns, along with innovative approaches to source and attract talent. Winners should showcase how their strategies were results-driven, innovative, and had a measurable impact on the organisation’s talent pipeline and overall success.

20. Excellence in Talent Management (New)

This award recognises an organisation that implemented an outstanding talent development plan. Entrants should show how the HR policies and strategies were effective on talent identification, management, and retention. Judges will look for succession planning initiatives that forecast a talent pipeline and its contribution to achieving leadership succession and business goals.

21. Excellence in Total Rewards Strategy (New)

This award recognises an organisation that implemented new and effective total rewards strategies to celebrate and incentivise its employees’ efforts and contributions towards its business. Judges will look for entries that exhibited genuine acknowledgment and impactful initiatives that inspired employees to be at their very best, resulting in improved employee engagement, productivity, and retention. Winners should demonstrate a clear understanding of employee needs and preferences, have implemented effective rewards programmes and initiatives, and prioritised employee growth and development.

22. Excellence in Use of HR Technology

This award recognises an organisation that implemented HR technology into its operations to improve business performance, efficiency, and productivity. Entrants should show their best implementation of the advanced HR technology and how they harnessed the data to exceed their business objectives. Judges will look for the complexity and size of the project or business issue, results on growth opportunities, and ROI from these initiatives.

23. Excellence in Workforce Mobility

This award recognises an organisation that implemented inclusive strategies that offered flexibility and remote working options, matching the needs of employees with the business function to maximise the employees’ working ability and efficiency, leading to enhanced organisational performance and results. Judges will look at how these mobility strategies positively impacted the staff’s work-life balance, while accounting for productivity and business success. The winner will stand out for its adept deployment of comprehensive international mobility policies, unwavering dedication to continuous learning and development, and a resolute focus on fostering employee growth and facilitating career advancement on the international stage.

24. Excellence in Workplace Culture

This award recognises an organisation that developed a strong workplace culture and values that have enhanced its business performance. Entrants should show how HR nurtured and communicated the cultural values to employees across all functions. Judges will look at the effectiveness of the organisation’s workplace culture initiatives in creating proactive employee engagement, and meeting business objectives. Winners should demonstrate how the positive workplace culture fostered employee growth and development, promoted diversity and inclusion, encouraged collaboration and teamwork, and prioritised employee wellbeing and development.

Talent Category

25. HR Leader of the Year (New)

This award recognises an exceptional HR leader who has demonstrated outstanding leadership and management skills, resulting in improved organisational performance and success. The winner will have demonstrated a commitment to ongoing learning and development, implemented effective HR strategies, and created a positive and supportive workplace culture.

Overall – NOT FOR ENTRY

26. HR Grand Winner
The most coveted of all achievements at the HR Excellence Awards, this prestigious title goes to the best performing entrant across all categories

Points System:
Gold: 4 points
Silver: 2 points
Bronze: 1 point

Tie-Breakers:
Most Gold: If total points are tied, the company with the highest number of Gold awards wins.
Most Silver: If Gold awards are also tied, the company with the highest number of Silver awards wins.
Highest Average Score: If a tie still persists, the company with the highest average