NEW ZEALAND BUSINESS NEWS
Empowering Kiwi Businesses
Business awards season brings a familiar debate for New Zealand company owners: is the trophy a genuine mark of quality, or a marketing product with a price tag? An unscientific online poll of 50 voters run by a business publication found that 45, or 90%, agreed that most awards are a marketing exercise. Polls like that prove little, but how three established programmes are run shows the answer varies sharply from one award to the next.
The Waikato Chamber of Commerce, which runs the Waikato Business Awards, is upfront that publicity and a stronger reputation with customers sit among the reasons to enter, alongside judges’ feedback and the discipline of examining your own operation. That is not a confession. The key distinction is whether recognition is earned through independent assessment or simply purchased.
The New Zealand Hi-Tech Awards levy no entry charge. The Hi-Tech Trust, which runs the programme, says sponsors and supporters fund it. Six local judges read the written entries and shortlist up to six finalists in each category. Those finalists then meet the panel face to face for half an hour, and an international judge joins for the final decision. Judges sign non-disclosure agreements and must declare any conflict of interest before they see an entry.
Entering free does not mean the exercise is free. Seats at the gala dinner cost $380 plus GST for entrants, and the trust points to professional entry writers who charge for their services. Those costs are disclosed rather than hidden, which is the point.
The Waikato Business Awards take a different approach, charging $199 plus GST for a first main-category entry and $99 plus GST for each additional one. Chamber membership is not required. Judges shortlist entries from written submissions, then visit finalists’ premises or interview individual and small-business entrants. Every entrant receives feedback, which is often the most valuable part of the process for a small operator.
The Deloitte Top 200 Awards invert the model entirely. In most categories, entrants submit nothing, because an independent panel nominates and interviews the finalists. The Company of the Year category is assessed on financial and non-financial measures, including reputation and how the business manages its environmental and people responsibilities. Finalists must declare any investigations or litigation and consent to background checks. Young Executive of the Year is the exception, taking one application per organisation endorsed by a senior leader.
Evidence on the value of a win points in two directions. A 1997 Management Science study by Kevin Hendricks and Vinod Singhal compared US businesses that won quality awards with similar businesses that did not. From six years before the first win to three years after, the median change in the winners’ operating income was 48% higher than the control group’s.
That study treated the awards as a proxy for a well-run quality programme, so it captured the work behind the trophy rather than the trophy itself. A 2009 study in the Quarterly Journal of Economics by Ulrike Malmendier and Geoffrey Tate found the opposite for US chief executives who picked up prestigious business press awards. Their companies subsequently underperformed, while the award-winning executives collected more pay and devoted more time to outside pursuits such as board seats and book writing. A prize can confirm good work; it does not do the work.
The practical test is the judging. A credible programme names its judges, or at least explains its judging process, and sets out how it handles conflicts. Publish criteria before anyone pays to enter, and make written feedback part of the deal.
The full cost needs to be added up before the decision, not after: the entry fee, any finalist charge, dinner tickets, a paid entry writer if one is used, and the staff hours spent writing the submission and hosting a site visit. A fee demanded after an entrant has been told they won is a warning sign.
Category depth matters too. A field of three entries says far less than a field of 30, and a winner decided by public vote measures reach rather than quality. Finally, the audience should be clear. A win customers never hear about can still be worth the money for staff morale or a hiring push, provided the business knows what it is buying.
The Hi-Tech Awards offers entrants one piece of advice that travels well: the most common mistake is failing to answer the question that was asked, because judges can only score what appears in the entry.
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