Beauty Shaker Awards in Canada

Over the last 5 years, L’Oréal Canada employees got to showcase their entrepreneurial and innovative spirit through the 531 projects they submitted to the Beauty Shaker Awards competition. This past January, we proudly celebrated the 5th edition of the Beauty Shaker Awards, during a ceremony that recognized and rewarded the employees for their achievements and innovative ideas. We invited Ariane, Talent Acquisition specialist to tell us more about this unique and innovative competition.

Tell us more about this project

The Beauty Shaker Awards is a competition dear to my heart that I led from April 2018 until the final ceremony which took place on January 24, 2019. It is a great platform for employees to receive recognition for their great successes but also for those who wish to see their ideas turned into concrete projects! During the entire Beauty Shaker journey, I got to witness their motivation, dedication and, of course, their competitive spirit! I am filled with pride when I think of all the amazing projects that were presented this year! We have a lot of amazing talents at L’Oréal Canada!

What is the purpose of the competition?

Beauty Shaker Awards is an annual internal competition that recognizes and rewards employees for their entrepreneurial spirit, greatest achievements and innovative ideas in 3 specific categories: Excellence, Innovation and Simplic-T. Some of these ideas are turned into concrete projects and can even become best practices that are shared internationally and are implemented by other L’Oréal subsidiaries. Furthermore, potential employees and new recruits get to see that it is possible for their ideas to be heard and even implemented — even in a multinational company. I truly believe that our employees, with their entrepreneurial spirit, are the ones who are leading the change and bringing innovation to the forefront!

What’s so special about the 5th edition of the Beauty Shaker Awards?

For the 5th edition, participants were showered with plenty of participation prizes including spa tickets, hotel getaway packages, passes to gym classes, festival tickets and the opportunity to attend the Shakira concert in Montreal and watch the show from the L’Oreal Canada corporate loge. The participants also had the option of attending coaching sessions with General Managers across all Divisions to help them perfect their pitch to the judges. I would like to thanks Benoit Pinsonneault (GM L’Oréal Professionnel , Kérastasse, Shu uemura and Puroleogy), Ali Fakih (GM Garnier), Emma Kindler (GM La Roche Posay and Dermablend) and Alexandre Ratté (GM Kiehl’s).

In addition to handing out awards from the 3 main categories of the competition — Excellence, Innovation and Simplici-T — a new award was added: the Employee Choice Award. This award recognizes the team that captivated and captured the public’s attention. Employees voted for their favorite team live during the ceremony using their cellphones!!! We really felt the excitement in the air! The honor went to a project called Sit back, mask and glow submitted by members of the Garnier team which included Lara Vekil, Adam Van Vlaardingen, Sabrina Pallotta and Estelle Ngo.

Are there any particular projects that grabbed your attention?

Mina Lagrève (Digital and Marketing Group Manager for IT cosmetics) and Jean-Charles Carrère (Manager Digital IT) submitted a project last year in the Innovation category, which recognizes innovative ideas, and they placed in the top 5.

However, this year they submitted the same project in the Excellence category, which rewards successful projects, and they won 1st place! The project, called SEO 360 LUXE puts the focus on the consumer. For instance, they researched what specific terminology consumer’s use when searching for beauty products online. They then brought their findings to the whole LUXE Division and applied it across all departments: from marketing to digital, to e-commerce, to retail. The entire Division stopped working in silos and everyone now speaks the same language! The biggest success of this project, however, is that they have successfully scaled it to all métiers and all brands at L’Oréal Canada. In other words, they were able to customize a subject and integrate it in each brand in an agile way.

“ For me, the Beauty Shaker experience is always unique, it is when I feel the proudest to work at L’Oréal Canada because I see tons of amazing talents and tons of amazing projects” — Frank Kollmar, CEO, L’Oréal Canada.

How are the projects chosen?

At midnight on July 20, 2018 — the Beauty Shaker submission deadline — 93 projects were registered, with more than 250 participants!

During the first round, 45 judges, divided into 6 multidisciplinary teams, used their expertise to review, analyze and judge the 93 projects submitted.

At the end of their mandate, 30 teams were selected to move on the semi-finals. The semi-finals took place on October 29, 2018 before an impressive jury comprised of our CEO, Frank Kollmar, General Managers and Directors of various L’Oréal Canada brands. The 30 semi-finalist teams had only five minutes to present their projects. The talent, passion and perseverance of the teams from the L’Oréal Canada Plant, the Head Office, the Distribution Center, and the Toronto office were on full display as the teams were determined to secure their place in the finals.

After a very intense day, all teams were invited to a VIP cocktail in recognition of the effort they put into their work and to announce the finalists.

Then, on January 21, 2019, 15 teams were invited to take part in the final stage: The Grand Finale! For this part, each team had to create a one-minute video explaining their project. They developed the concept, wrote the script, integrated the music and produced the final video content. The originality and creativity of each final video is quite impressive!

In addition to the video, each team had to prepare a seven-minute presentation. The level of the competition was very high and the deliberation was heart-wrenching for the jury, which consisted of Frank Kollmar, CEO, and L’Oréal Canada VPs.

How does the competition end?

The competition ended with an amazing ceremony to celebrate the success of our dedicated employees. Our CEO, Frank Kollmar hosted the ceremony, together with VPs from all Divisions. Each category was introduced by a member of L’Oréal Canada’s Executive Committee who expressed their appreciation for the hard work and all the innovative ideas submitted by the teams. All employees in attendance at the ceremony thoroughly enjoyed watching — not to mention how impressed they were — by the videos produced by their colleagues! There was an immense feeling of team spirit throughout the whole evening and a great sense of pride from everyone. It is worth mentioning that the first place prize is 10 000 $, 2nd place is 5 000 $ and 3rd place is 2 500 $. Furthermore, all finalists in the Simplici-T category receive an implementation budget of up to 20 000 $ to help them bring their project to life. We concluded the evening by celebrating our successes with a cocktail and taking photos in a chic, custom-built, gold photobooth. We are already anxious and excited to see what great ideas and projects will be generated in the next edition!