Peer Appreciation in the Workplace

Organizations are deploying gratitude-tracking systems to encourage appreciation, promote pro-sociality, and monitor employee wellbeing. We present the case study of one such system, called Gratia, adopted by a Fortune 500 company for over four years. We analyzed 422,209 messages of thanks and examined temporal patterns of appreciation, reciprocity, and repeated interactions. We also compared the formal organizational chart to the informal network expressed through the system. We found that gratitude is strongly reciprocated, that time between thanks is relatively long, and that it is predominantly given to peers outside one's immediate team.