you know an award is actually legit when someone from a trade body contacts you the week before sounding slightly put out that nobody from your member company is flying to Europe to attend their event even though you did fill out an application form, you assume their event must be a bit short of attendees but reluctantly dip into the small startup budget for a single person to fly out there because "something something networking", and then your colleague gets surprised by actually winning it whilst surrounded by the teams everyone else sent.

on the other hand, I found it hilarious one of my father's old companies publicly sponsored a special new category of award at a legit-seeming construction event. You'll never guess who won...