Let’s Boost

VMware

People referral program, event poster for employee referral program, visual of a magician's hat with floating human icons representing referrals, promoting employee referral event at Cafe London, relevant for employer branding and employee engagement.
Playing card Ace of Hearts with a heart-shaped graphic made of diverse people icons and a hand holding a pen, representing community and engagement.
VMware Bulgaria, a software giant and the largest office of the company in Eastern Europe, had an internal Employee Referral Program (ERP). However, despite some applications coming through the ERP, it wasn’t as successful as they had hoped. Employee interest was rapidly declining, largely due to the overly aggressive internal advertising. To address this, we introduced a gamification model—a ranking system. We also maintained the emphasis on the program but shifted the approach to advertising it. Our team created products featuring software engineering jokes, branded with the ERP logo, and set up a “Wall of Honor” for the ‘ERP rock stars,’ as we called them. Additionally, we dedicated a “Beer Bash” event to the program. While we kept VMware’s existing award system, we revamped the prizes to make them more personal. The program began to thrive immediately, and now, a significant portion of applicants come through it.