As we finally get back to normal after two years of the coronavirus pandemic, one constant worry is more intense than ever: companies are struggling to find the right employees as workers look very closely at where they could earn a living.
It’s a tough game, especially since the unemployment rate has returned to pre-pandemic levels. How can a company gain an advantage?
If you’re hiring, one of the most powerful affirmations you can make is that you’re a Top Workplace.
This means that the Hearst Connecticut Media Top Workplaces awards are given to employers in Fairfield, New Haven, and Litchfield counties. We are now entering our 12th year, a great time for anyone hiring – private companies, nonprofits, publicly traded companies, even government agencies – to show all the ways they have appreciated employees throughout the coronavirus crisis.
Applications are open for the 2021 competition.
Click on here to see the 2021 winners coverage.
Watch this animated video on how Top Workplaces works.
Click on www.topworkplaces.com/nominate/hearstct/ to name your company, whether you are the CEO or the new employee.
Ask Maria Coutant Skinner what this has meant for the combined company where she is CEO, McCall Center for Behavioral Health and Help Inc., the nonprofit mental health and addiction services organizations of Litchfield County and the Waterbury area.
“With employees having many options as to where they want to go to work,” CEO Coutant Skinner said, “We’re emphasizing that.”
Companies say recognition works for recruiting, it works for the information they receive through employee surveys, and it works for morale – at a tough time.
“Like many workplaces, particularly in healthcare, we have faced heartbreaking challenges, but our staff have never wavered with their unwavering commitment and dedication to their colleagues and customers,” Coutant said. Skinner, of the two nonprofits merging this year.
She tells a story about last month’s peak of the omicron variant, when more than 20% of staff – including herself – were sick or unable to work. “everyone who wasn’t sick stepped in,” she said, including the director of outpatient services who was flipping pancakes for residential clients.
Top Workplaces celebrates this spirit. We seek to reward the best places to work, regardless of their type of employer. A company does not need to have its headquarters here to be competitive.
The competition is open to any employer of 35 or more people in the three counties. Recognition is given to small, medium and large organizations, and the competition also rewards top executives, including Coutant Skinner, last year’s winner for midsize companies.
Hurry, nominations close Friday, March 11. The cost to compete – and win – is zero.
Last year, Hearst Connecticut Media honored 56 employers from across the region. The awards are based on short 24-question employee surveys conducted by our partner, Energage, on how employers value their ideas, communicate, implement their strategies, operate ethically, and create a workplace culture of excellence. team and competence.
The current reigning top winners of 2021 include Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices New England Properties (1st place among Large Employers for the fourth consecutive year) and Bridgewater Associates at No. 2 for the Large Size category. Gaylord Specialty Healthcare was #3 among large employers.
For mid-sized employers, Splash Car Wash has won the top spot after many years of coming together. No 2 was High Watch Recovery Center and No 3 was HAI Group, a specialist insurer with housing authorities, based in Cheshire.
Criterion, a small but global software developer in Norwalk, won 1st place among small employers for the second time in two years of participating in the competition. Danbury-based Autism Behavioral Health was No. 2 among small employers for the second year in a row. The Star Supply Co. of New Haven was No. 3.
Only one company, ICON International Inc., the Greenwich-based corporate barter company, has made the list of winners every 11 years. All of these winners, and the 56 on the 2021 list, have incredible stories to tell about working with the coronavirus. And they can tell you why their Top Workplaces designation matters.
Winners of Hearst Connecticut Media’s Best Workplaces will be featured in the Connecticut Post, The News-Times of Danbury, Greenwich Time, The Stamford Advocate, The Norwalk Hour, New Haven Register and The Citizen Register of Torrington in September – and will be highlighted on all associated websites.
For full coverage of last year’s winners, go to the websites of any of these outlets and type in /topworkplaces – such as www.ctpost.com/topworkplaces.
Energage carries out Top Workplaces surveys for more than 40 metropolitan newspapers, including some of the largest. The company surveyed more than 20 million employees in tens of thousands of organizations.
Energage launched its Top Workplaces USA designation in 2022, with top of the top winners having at least 150 employees. McCall/Help and several of our other 2021 winners made this national list this month.
Employers can be named online at https://topworkplaces.com/nominate/hearstct or by calling 203-617-0727.
Dan Haar is associate editor and columnist at Hearst Connecticut Media Group.
dhaar@hearstmediact.com
