by Erik Sandgren, Lead Cybersecurity Awarness Expert, September 17 2026

Four steps to engage every employee, at every location in an effective way

Cybersecurity Awareness Month is a valuable opportunity to engage employees, but reaching a dispersed workforce can be challenging.

The activity must work across offices, time zones, and sometimes even countries and languages. It should be easy for local teams to organize, equally accessible to remote employees, and engaging enough to stand out from everyday security communications.

1. Make it fun and engaging

Let’s face it: standard compliance videos and mandatory reading don’t exactly inspire enthusiasm. To get people to actually pay attention to security hygiene, you have to capture their interest.

Gamification transforms passive learning into active participation. By using an interactive cybersecurity escape room, employees are placed into the center of the action. Instead of being told about AI Voice cloning, they have to listen to suspicious voice messages to “escape” a scenario.

Instead of reading about password complexity, they have to crack a code. This hands-on, puzzle-solving approach makes the lessons stick and turns a mandatory chore into an activity your team will genuinely look forward to. Importantly, choose a game designed for everyday employees, not cybersecurity specialists.

2. Make it competitive with company leaderboards

Nothing drives participation quite like a little healthy competition. When you introduce a scoring system and a visible leaderboard, you tap into your employees’ natural desire to win—and earn bragging rights.

Leaderboards can be structured in whatever way fits your company culture best. You can track individual high scores, or better yet, spark friendly rivalries by tracking department vs. department, or region vs. region. When the Marketing team sees that the Finance team is beating them on the cybersecurity leaderboard, you won’t even need to remind them to participate; their own competitive drive will do the work for you.

Make sure your setup can associate results with the relevant team, location or division. If the team and individual versions differ, use separate leaderboards rather than comparing unlike results.

Employees do not all need to play at the same time. Keep the competition open for a defined period so offices and shifts can take part when it suits them. Share leaderboard updates along the way to maintain interest.

Alongside the highest scores, consider an award for the location with the highest participation rate.

3. Offer different ways to participate

Your workforce is likely a mix of remote, hybrid, and on-site employees. A one-size-fits-all event won’t work. The beauty of a web-based escape room or game is its ultimate flexibility. You can deploy a single link across a variety of formats to meet employees where they are.

Before you launch – decide on:
Learning objective: What should employees understand or do differently afterward?
Participation target: How many employees do you want to reach, and where?
Campaign window: When does participation open and close?
Ownership: Who coordinates centrally, and who helps locally?

4. How to build excitement with promotion and prizes

Even the best activity won’t succeed if no one knows about it. You don’t need a degree in marketing to promote your event, but you do need to move beyond a single, plain-text email.

Build anticipation by sharing inspiring teaser videos, engaging graphics, and short, punchy texts across all your communication channels (Slack, Teams, the company intranet, and email). Keep the messaging light and exciting. Finally, sweeten the deal with prizes. They don’t have to break the budget—gift cards, company swag, a free lunch, or even an extra half-day of PTO are highly effective motivators that will ensure a massive turnout.

Recognize more than the overall champion. Local winners, creative team names and strong participation all provide opportunities to celebrate involvement. The aim is to make employees feel part of a shared experience, even if they do not finish at the top of the leaderboard.

A simple communication schedule keeps the campaign manageable:

Before launch: Share a teaser and announce the dates, format and prizes. Ask managers to make time for their teams to participate.
At launch: Send the game link with clear instructions, expected duration and the closing date.
During the competition: Share leaderboard updates, celebrate participating teams and remind employees how to join.
After the deadline: Announce the winners, award prizes and share the main security takeaways.

After the campaign: Measure results and reinforce the learning

IT leaders answer to CISOs and executive boards who care about outcomes, not just enthusiasm. Adding a point about tracking participation rates, score distributions, and common knowledge gaps gives IT teams the reporting data they need to demonstrate real ROI to management.