Boost employee morale by offering an incentive program. Structuring a program that rewards only your top few people is a recognition program and does nothing for the employee morale of your general work environment and population. You can pick the winners on the first day. On the other hand, an effective motivation program structures incentives so that each worker has the opportunity to earn based on exceeding his/her past performance, thereby increasing everyone’s employee morale. This is not to say that recognizing top performers is bad. On the contrary, if you don't, some other company will. Just be sure to structure an incentive program as that, and then provide additional awards to recognize top performers.