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Best Places to Work in the Valley
The Best Places to Work in the Valley awards are presented by BestCompaniesAZ and The Phoenix Business Journal. Since 2003, we have been recognizing the best companies in the Phoenix metro area.
FAQ's - Best Places to Work in the Valley Program
- What is the Best Places to Work in the Valley Program ?
- What is the goal/objective of the program?
- Who can participate?
- Is there a cost to participate?
- Do participating companies receive survey feedback?
- What is the process?
- What is the timeline?
- What are the benefits of participating?
- How will companies be selected for the list?
- What if a company does not make the list?
- Confidentiality
What is the Best Places to Work in the Valley program?
The Best Places to Work in the Valley is a local contest designed to identify the best places of employment in the Metro-Phoenix area based 100% on employee opinion survey results. The program was founded in 2003 by BestCompaniesAZ, The Great Place to Work Institute (research partner for Fortune Magazine 100 Best Companies to Work for in America), and our local Media Partner, the Phoenix Business Journal. In 2004 we transitioned over to research partner, Quantum Market Research, the exclusive research partner for Best Places to Work competitions in 40 US cities. As a result, participants have access to the country's largest database of comparative benchmarking.
What is the goal/objective of the program?
To identify the best places of employment in the Metro-Phoenix area (Maricopa and Pinal counties) for the benefit of the local economy, business and workforce.
Our primary focus:
- To create and publish a highly credible list valued by employees and management.
- To foster a competitive spirit among valley businesses for improving workplaces in Metro-Phoenix.
- To obtain information about Metro-Phoenix's businesses to help raise workplace
standards throughout the valley by benchmarking workplace performance now and into
the future.
- To help the valley attract and retain a talented workforce.
- To promote Arizona’s best employment opportunities on an exclusive website
Who can participate?
We are looking for local companies that employ at least 10 employees in the Metro-Phoenix area (Maricopa and Pinal counties). These companies can be for-profit, non-profit, private, public, subsidiaries or business units, government or state agencies, or charitable organizations. The 10+ employees must be full-time or part-time Arizona-based employees (seasonal, temporaries or contractors should not be included in this headcount).
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Is there a cost to participate?
There is no fee to participate in the survey. Plus, you will receive a free Category Overview Report from Quantum Market Research. This report shows how your employees responded in the 10 specific categories (listed below). If you are interested in customizing your report or purchasing a full detailed report of your results contact Bev@BestCompaniesAZ.com for details.
Categories Surveyed:
- Team Effectiveness
- Retention Risk
- Alignment with Goals
- Trust with Coworkers
- Individual Contribution
- Manager Effectiveness
- Trust in Senior Leaders
- Feeling Valued
- Work Engagement
- People Practices
Do participating companies receive survey feedback?
All particpating companies receive a free category report (see # 5 below). The top three finalists in each of the four categories (micro, small, medium and large-sized companies) will receive a free complimentary standardized report showing the participating company's scores against the average of all participating companies in that tier (micro, small, medium or large-sized company). The report will also illustrate your company's scores vs. the average of all other companies in your category or tier.
- Sign Up! Sign up your company at http://phoenix.bizjournals.com/phoenix/nomination/.
The application is brief and should take less than 5-10 minutes to complete.
- Register Your Company
Once you have signed up to participate, by early September you will receive an e-mail
from Quantum Workplace that contains the rules of the competition and a link to the online registration page. Here, you will be given your company's Organization Code and directed
to the survey website.
- Consider survey customizations -
Participants may benefit from customizing their employee survey for $2,000+. Contact Bev@bestcompaniesaz.com to assist with customizations which include:
- adding questions unique to your company or industry
- adding custom demographics to enhance your slicing functions,
(i.e. by department or location)
- surveying employees outside your contest area
- adding questions unique to your company or industry
-
Take the survey -
Once you have your company's Organization Code, distribute it to
your employees along with a link to the Quantum Workplace website so that they may complete the survey online. The survey contains approximately 40 likert-scale questions
and one open-ended question, and takes less than 10 minutes to complete.
By taking this survey, you will be able to measure how your company stacks-up against
other same-size employers. - Purchase Survey Results and Advanced reporting options -
Your participation in this survey is an excellent opportunity to learn what your employees are really thinking, and provides you with valuable information you can use to improve your day-to-day operations
and workplace environment. For those who want to capitalize on this opportunity, Quantum offers a suite of add-on reporting options. There are three reporting packages that come
with various combinations of analytical tools starting at $500, $750 up to $1,250.
- Survey Consultation provided by BestCompaniesAZ:
Receive pre-planning assistance and an individualized consultation session with BestCompaniesAZ consultants, your
experts on building "best places to work". BestCompaniesAZ can help your company
produce customized sample emails from CEO, strategies to produce high response rate, consultation on adding custom questions to address current issues, and other custom demographics. Call or email today if we can assist - 480-545-5151, Bev@BestCompaniesAz.com.
What is the timeline?
Early July - End of August
Companies sign up to participate.
Beginning of September
Quantum will provide each participating company with instructions on how to disseminate the employee survey to the local workforce.
Each company will need to prepare a communication instructing employees to visit a specific URL which will require the organization code.
ALL full-time and part-time LOCAL employees should be invited to participate in the survey online. Temporary, contractors or seasonal employees should NOT be included in the survey.
The survey is anonymous and should take employees about 15 minutes to complete online. Paper versions of the survey are available. Spanish version is available upon request.
Month of September
Employees complete online survey
Mid October
Each company is notified by the Phoenix Business Journal as to whether or not they have made a list.
2nd Thursday in December
Celebratory awards luncheon announcing winners and rankings in each category (micro, small, medium and large-sized companies).
A special Best Places to Work supplement section, including all four lists will be published in the Phoenix Business Journal and on BestCompaniesAZ website.
What are the benefits of participating?
Decades of research demonstrates a positive correlation between progressive people practices and increased financial performance. For instance, publicly held companies on Fortune magazine's "100 Best Companies to Work For" list historically have far outperformed the stock market averages over recorded three, five and ten year periods. The same correlation can be found among local 2005 "Best Place to Work" companies when comparing their performance to the S&P 500.
The Phoenix public companies showed a return of almost double the S&P 12 month return. Some specific areas of improved financial performance that firms with better workplace practices can typically expect are:
- Lower turnover costs. Companies on "best lists" typically experience lower turnover rates
that are about one-half that of their industries.
- Ability to attract and retain higher quality candidates.
- Lower costs associated with the negative aspects of bad workplaces - better attendance, lower medical costs resulting from stress-related illness, fewer on-the-job accidents.
- Higher levels of autonomy, innovation and risk-taking.
- Increased public profile and positive recognition increasing employee pride.
- Higher degree of employee satisfaction.
- Higher degree of customer satisfaction.
- Opportunity to advertise and promote your "best place to work award" on an exclusive
niche site created for ONLY valley "Best Companies" - www.BestCompaniesAZ.com. - Opportunity to be featured in special Phoenix Business Journal supplement promoting
your company and award.
How will companies be selected for the list?
The list of Best Places to Work in the Valley will be based solely on the employees' survey results. For the company's results to be statistically valid and to qualify for the competition, companies need to get employee participation based on the following percentages per size of the organization:
10-24 employees – 90%
25 - 50 employees - 85%
51 - 150 employees - 70%
151 - 500 employees - 50%
501 - 1,000 employees - 30%
1,001 - 3,000 employees - 15%
3,001 - 5,000 employees - 8%
More than 5000 employees- 5%
In other words, a company with 17,000 locally-based employees would need at least 850 employees to participate. A company with 100 employees would need 70 of its employees to participate, and so on.
Quantum will notify each participating company prior to the cutoff date if the appropriate response rate indicated above has not been received.
We will select the top companies in the following categories:
Micro-sized companies: 10-49 employees
Small-sized companies: 50-99 employees
Medium-sized companies: 100-249 employees
Large-sized companies - 250-2,999 employees
X-Large sized companies - 3000+ employees
An overall favorable company score must first be achieved to make the list (using a ranking formula which will be determined by Quantum once all company results are in), and then each company wil be listed in rank order based on overall rating.
Note:
An overall favorable company composite score of 85%+ was required to land on the list, and then companies were ranked 1-25 in each category. These numbers may vary based on level of participation each year.
What if a company does not make the list?
If your company does not appear on the Best Places to Work in the Valley list, it will still experience advantages from participating.
- Feedback Reports - Your workplace will have the opportunity to purchase the survey feedback online through Quantum Workplace as indicated above. This report will show
how the employees responded to the questions in the employee survey. This information
can be extremely valuable for it can highlight the strengths and weaknesses of your
company so that you can prioritize future activities and move towards the goal of becoming one of the best workplaces in the valley in the future.
- Individualized Consultation - You can also schedule an individualized consultation with BestCompaniesAZ, Founding Partner of the Best Places to Work program.
This consultation includes:- Survey Analysis and Reporting - BestCompaniesAZ can assist analyzing Quantum's survey results and preparing and presenting a report to management
on common themes, strengths, weaknesses, and action plans for improvement.
- Benchmarking - In additional to your survey benchmarking options, BestCompaniesAZ can also benchmark your HR programs, policies, procedures, benefits and perks against the benchmark data from prior Best Companies.
- Facilitation of Focus Groups -Focus Group facilitation is also available upon request with two experienced "best place to work" facilitators.
Contact us today for pricing!
- Survey Analysis and Reporting - BestCompaniesAZ can assist analyzing Quantum's survey results and preparing and presenting a report to management
Confidentiality
Companies that participate but do not make the list will not be disclosed. We do not reveal whether or not a company has participated for selection on the list.
Program Partners
Founding Partner - BestCompaniesAZ
BestCompaniesAZ provides a unique mix of branding, human resources, marketing/public relations and organizational programs designed to “Recognize Best Companies of Today and Build Best Companies for Tomorrow.” For more information on Our Services
.
Founding Partner - The Phoenix Business Journal
The Phoenix Business Journal is the Valley's leading source of in-depth local business news. Published every Friday, The Phoenix Business Journal has the largest paid subscriber base of any weekly news publication and an audited weekly readership of over 95,000.
Research Partner - Quantum Workplace
Quantum Workplace is a market research company that surveys employee engagement, loyalty and retention. Best known as the research firm behind the Best Places to Work programs in more than 40 metro areas, Quantum Workplace surveys more than 1.5 million employees among 5,000+ companies nationwide. For additional information on employee engagement please go do www.quantumworkplace.com.
