# Choose who can nominate for an award

> Set who can nominate and who can receive an award on its Eligibility and approvals step. Limits you reuse across awards can be saved as eligibility rules.

- Product: Recognition › Awards and quotas
- Who can do this: Super admins and admins with manage awards
- Plan: Recognition
- Where: Admin dashboard
- Last checked: 15 Oct 2026
- Web page: https://www.vantagecircle.com/en/help/recognition/awards-and-quotas/choose-who-can-nominate/

Each award has its own limits on who can nominate and who can receive it. You set them on the award's **Eligibility and approvals** step, when you create it or with **Edit**.

## Limits on the award

- **Nominator grade groups**: only people in these grade groups can nominate. CSV awards don't have this, because nobody nominates for them.
- **Where is this award available?**: the countries the award can be given in.
- **Tenure eligibility (months)**: turn it on to set a **Minimum months employed** and a **Maximum months**, separately **For receivers** and **For nominators**. Leave the maximum empty for no limit.
- **Limit nominations to specific employees**: only the people you add can nominate.
- **Allow self-nominations**: shows if your company allows self-nominations. Choose **Self and others** or **Self only**.
- **Use eligibility rules**: apply one or more saved rules. Select **Create eligibility rule** to make a new one without leaving the award.

## Reusable eligibility rules

When several awards or badges share the same limits, save them once as a rule in **Recognition → Eligibility rules**, then pick it under **Use eligibility rules**. See [Create an eligibility rule](/en/help/recognition/recognition-settings/create-an-eligibility-rule/).

A rule is shared. Changing it changes every award that uses it.

## What nominators see

When someone is outside the limits, the nomination is refused with a message. For example:

- "You are not allowed to award yourself!" when self-nomination is off.
- "Not eligible, as the minimum tenure for this recognition is 6 months from DOJ!" when a receiver hasn't been employed long enough.
- "Not eligible, as your previous nomination for the same user is still pending!" when their earlier nomination of that person is still waiting.

## Who can do this

The **Awards** page shows for super admins and admins with the **Manage awards** permission.