The Covid-19 pandemic triggered a historic quitting spree that has forced companies to re-think not just where to work, but how to improve the employee experience.
According to new research from LinkedIn, some corporations have navigated these seismic shifts to work better than others.
On Wednesday, the networking platform released its annual Top Companies list identifying the 50 best places in the U.S. for professionals to grow their careers. Amazon ranked No. 1 on the list, followed by Alphabet (Google's parent company) and Wells Fargo.
Here are the 10 best companies to work for in 2022, according to LinkedIn:
1. Amazon
Headquarters: Seattle, Washington
Industry: Technology
CEO: Andy Jassy
2. Alphabet
Headquarters: Mountain View, California
Industry: Technology
CEO: Sundar Pichai
3. Wells Fargo
Headquarters: San Francisco, California
Industry: Banking
CEO: Charles W. Scharf
4. JPMorgan Chase & Co.
Headquarters: New York, New York
Industry: Banking
CEO: Jamie Dimon
5. Walmart
Headquarters: Bentonville, Arkansas
Industry: Retail
CEO: Doug McMillon
6. IBM
Headquarters: Armonk, New York
Industry: Technology
CEO: Arvind Krishna
7. AT&T
Headquarters: Dallas, Texas
Industry: Telecommunications
CEO: John T. Stankey
8. Bank of America
Headquarters: Charlotte, North Carolina
Industry: Banking
CEO: Brian Moynihan
9. Apple
Headquarters: Cupertino, California
Industry: Technology
CEO: Tim Cook
10. Comcast
Headquarters: Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Industry: Telecommunications, Entertainment
CEO: Brian L. Roberts
For the report, LinkedIn scoured millions of employee profiles and insights about companies submitted on the platform between January and December 2021. Researchers focused on companies with at least 500 employees, rating each organization on seven factors:
- Ability to advance: the frequency and speed at which employees are promoted
- Skills growth: how employees gain new skills once hired
- Company stability: attrition and employee retention
- External opportunity: how often recruiters from other companies search for and contact employees
- Company affinity: how many employees are connected to each other on LinkedIn
- Gender diversity: gender parity within a company and its subsidiaries
- Educational background: the different education levels among employees
Amazon claimed this year's No. 1 spot after making "significant investments" to improve employees' well-being and support their upskilling, Dan Roth, the editor-in-chief and vice president at LinkedIn tells CNBC Make It.
"The thing that we're measuring on this list is 'Does this [company] help you grow in your career? and Amazon, according to all of our data, is absolutely the number one place for that," he adds.
In the last 12 months the e-commerce company has more than doubled the maximum base salary for corporate employees, introduced new mental health benefits and announced that they would cover 100% of tuition costs for hourly employees, to name a few examples.
It's important to note, however, that Amazon has faced a barrage of criticism for its treatment of warehouse employees during the Covid-19 pandemic and fostering a brutal workplace culture. Just last week Amazon workers at a Staten Island warehouse voted to unionize, becoming the first group at a U.S. facility operated by the tech giant to do so. Amazon did not immediately respond to CNBC Make It's request for comment.
Amazon CEO Andy Jassy acknowledged that the company could improve its treatment of employees during the GeekWire Summit in Seattle back in October. "I think if you have a large group of people like we do — we have 1.2 million employees — it's almost like a small country," he said. "There are lots of things you could do better."
There's three elements that set the top companies apart from their competition: offering flexible work arrangements, ample professional development opportunities (tuition job rotations, mentorship) and robust mental health services (no-cost counseling, additional paid time off), Roth adds.
Disclosure: Comcast is the owner of NBCUniversal, parent company of CNBC.
Check out:
10 companies with the best workplace cultures, including pay, perks and work-life balance
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