I created this newsletter as part of employee recognition and rewards program my team developed for our senior capstone simulated company, Renewergy. It highlights the achievements of various teams and provides insight on how to boost appreciation efforts within the office.

1. Welcome
The Employee Recognition and Rewards Team here at Renewergy is thrilled
to debut your monthly employee newsletter with this issue.Through this
publication, we aim to highlight the incredible work that our employees are
constantly producing and developing, which will achieve a few different goals:
• Keep employees more informed of our collective accomplishments and
upcoming initiatives.
• Recognize the hard work that our employees put in to make our
Renewergy an awesome local powerhouse.
• Establish the means to discover opportunities for collaboration or to
provide feedback between teams internally.
To that end, we welcome feedback from all Renewergy employees on this
newsletter and encourage teams to submit updates and accomplishments to
recognition@renewergy.com on a rolling basis.Thank you!
At the beginning of 2017, Renewergy received the results of an external
audit of recruitment and retention practices which concluded that many
improvements needed to be made.
Hiring excellent talent is a crucial first step in the success of a company,
and Renewergy’s existing instructional designers lacked the necessary
competencies to excel within our unique corporate culture. In turn, our
Human Resources department set out to create competency models that
outline key skills required for the instructional designer position.
Through extensive research and interviewing, HR established concrete
performance parameters for communication with constituents, conducting
investigations, producing training materials, conducting evaluations, and
taking advantage of resources.Through this competency modeling process,
the HR team has been able to onboard three new talented instructional
designers and provide development opportunities for existing instructional
design professionals at Renewergy.
We commend HR for their dedication and commitment to ensuring that
Renewergy employees represent the best of the best in both the region
and the sustainability industry overall.
New & Improved Competency Model
Telling people that you’re
grateful for them is one
of the best ways to build
morale and team spirit. Here
are 7 ways to say thank you
to an employee or coworker
the Renewergy way!
1) Call out their efforts by
writing on the Win Wall.
2) Plan a fun outing. Happy
hour anyone?
3) Send an email to your
whole team or bring up their
above-and-beyond effort in a
meeting.
4) Leave an appreciative
sticky note on their
computer monitor.
5) Bring in a sweet or savory
treat for them (or the whole
team!).
6) Post on social media
about how awesome they
are. Others are likely to join
in the love fest!
7) Go back to basics with a
handwritten thank-you card.

2. Updated Brand Identity Standards
On March 1, the Identity Standards department here at Renewergy hosted a town hall meeting about the
new logos and color schemes that represent the company’s brand.All employees received new business
cards, branded pens, and Renewergy clothing. April 1 saw the debut of Renewergy’s change in
infrastructure and vehicles—the new sign out front, trucks, and materials packaging all have the new logo.
The Identity Standards department also announced Renewergy’s new look
on social media and switched all platforms to match those new guidelines.
These posts got thousands of social media impressions and engagement
skyrocketed as customers responded to the new branding in a primarily
positive way.
Because employee feedback is a prioritiy at Renewergy, the Identity
Standards department surveyed employees about their opinions on the new
logo and any implementation suggestions that would make the transition
easier for them. Employee satisfaction ratings for the new standards showed roughly 90% positive in this
survey—in fact, the primary suggestion that employees provided was a desire for more Renewergy swag
that displayed the logo so that they could represent the new look in their office supplies and apparel alike.
As a company, we are now more unified, modern, and clear about our brand positioning and services
(solar, wind, power). Even better, people both internal and external to Renewergy are responding well to
the switch, and we can’t wait to see brand recognition in Ithaca go through the (solar-paneled) roof.
Hiring for Diversity and inclusion
In a multifaceted effort to improve employee representation from all groups, Renewergy’s Talent
Acquisition Team has been working to reach new candidates via digital, conference networking, job fairs
and campus recruitment across the country, and professional development organizations.
Each of these approaches has an eye towards hiring more diversely, including
tailoring job postings to highlight workplace culture and engaging with
conferences and professional organizations that impact underrepresented
groups (including racial minorities, LGBTQ community, veterans, refugees, and
people with disabilities). Managers have been trained in hiring standardization,
including workshops on EEOC, selecting interview questions that are both legal
and ethical, and the revitalized candidate evaluation form.
The Talent Acquisition Team has also created a retention plan to maintain these employees once hired.The
approach includes affinity groups and employee resource groups,“recruitment relevant to community”
(which allows individual employees to contribute towards recruitment efforts by becoming thought
leaders for their area of expertise or any underrepresented community they identify with), and
company-wide cultural competency trainings.
Most importantly, the Talent Acquisition Team has set out this guideline for Renewergy’s philosophy
towards diversity and inclusion both in hiring and in day-to-day interactions:“Differences are an opportu-
nity for growth.” Diversity is indeed the way to move our company forward, and we’re excited to continue
bringing in and retaining talent that represents the world around us.

3. Solare product line update
The Solare family of products has been selling like wildfire! As of this month, the sleek Classico solar panel
has sold over 20,000 units to both individual family homes and local Ithaca-area businesses. Below, see the
year-to-date sales numbers for our most popular products in the Estate and Universita lines.
Estate universita
gosun
grill
285 units
“Jamie”
Backpack
440 units
goal zero
generator
900 units
“Maggie” tent
315 units
“Taylor” Sunglasses
525 units
eton
speakers
800 units
“elsa”
backpack
800 units
miller
desk lamp
325 units

4. upcoming Performance management system
With the implementation date of February 1, 2018 rapidly approaching to roll out
Renewergy’s new performance management system, employees are actively preparing
by creating professional SMART (specific, measurable, attainable, realistic, timely) goals.
They will meet with their supervisiors to discuss their individual career trajectories
and progress towards a 5-year plan. Each department is also working to pre-determine
measures of quality and efficiency based on their methods of output. As the
Performance Management Team passes key milestones towards the implementation of
the new system, we will continue to use this newsletter to update our employees.
Renewergy Gives (A Lot) Back
1,780 employee participants
9,500 hours logged
95 media mentions
70% local, 30% national
60,000+ website views
5:39 average time spent
73% response to survey
86% satisfaction with program
39% higher employee retention
42% increased sales
Renewergy Gives Back was launched in February 2017 and has already proved to be a resounding success!
Over 71% of employees have participated in the program and have logged thousands of hours of local
community service. Already this has decreased employee turnover and boosted our company’s brand
awareness and sales. Internally, Renewergy employees have shown satisfaction with both the program and
overall company culture post-implementation, citing higher engagement, productivity, and purpose at work.
Renewergy Gives Back has also attracted local and national media attention as well as directed people
towards our corporate social responsibility website.We’re thrilled about employees’ excitement about
giving back, and we appreciate everyone’s collective dedication to sustainability and other causes.