23 CA Companies Among 2021 Best 100 To Work For: Fortune

ACROSS CALIFORNIA — The businesses ranked among this year’s 100 Best Companies To Work For have at least one thing in common: They treated employees well during the pandemic.

The 24th annual list, compiled by Fortune and Great Place To Work, honors the “most heroic companies supporting their people and communities in the U.S. during this historically challenging year,” according to a release by Fortune.

California has 23 companies on the list, including the top two. Cisco, based in San Jose, California, topped this year’s list. The company, which makes network and other communications equipment, employed 36,374 people as of March 2021. Cisco, ranked fourth last year, has been on the list every year since its creation.

Rounding out the top 5 were Salesforce, based in San Francisco; Hilton, based in McLean, Virginia; Wegmans, based in Rochester, New York; and Rocket Companies, based in Detroit, Michigan.

Other companies on this year’s list from California include:

Intuit

• Industry: Computer software
• Rank last year: 11
• Employees: 11,481
• Percentage of women: 45 percent
• Percentage of minorities: 46 percent
• Revenue ($M): $7,717

Silicon Valley-based Intuit makes the list for the 20th year. During the pandemic, the company has funded retirement plans with restricted stock units and bonuses and gave every employee eight days off to “recharge.”

Nvidia

• Industry: Semiconductors and Other Electronic Components
• Rank last year: 27
• Employees: 18,975
• Percentage of women: 18.6 percent
• Percentage of minorities: 53.5 percent
• Revenue ($M): $16,675

The graphics cards maker jumped 15 places on the list this year. CEO Jensen Huang aided employees by initiating salary increases and pledging to match employee contributions to COVID-19 relief.

Kimpton Hotel and Restaurants

• Industry: Hotels, Casinos, Resorts
• Rank last year: 10
• Employees: 3,204
• Percentage of women: 42.3 percent
• Percentage of minorities: 49.7 percent

Kimpton, based in San Francisco, helped its workers find temporary jobs at other companies after business was shut down starting last March.

Adobe

• Industry: Computer Software
• Rank last year: 35
• Employees: 12,300
• Revenue ($M): $13,682

Adobe, located in Silicon Valley, made a commitment to not lay off workers at the beginning of the pandemic and was applauded for its response to the racial justice movement in 2020.

Nugget Market

• Industry: Food & Drug Stores
• Rank last year: 79
• Employees: 2,150
• Percentage of women: 46.6 percent
• Percentage of minorities: 45.5 percent

This small chain of grocery stores in Sacramento has maintained hero pay throughout the pandemic and hired outside security to ensure mask restrictions were being obeyed.

The other companies from California on the list were:

• Experian
• The Cheesecake Factory
• Atlassian
• Splunk
• Genentech
• Orrick
• Cadence
• Scripps Health
• ServiceNow
• Robert Half International
• Protiviti
• CrowdStrike Holdings
• HP
• Farmers Insurance
• Twilio
• First American Financial

To compile this year’s list, Great Place to Work surveyed more than a half-million employees on issues including how trustworthy, caring and fair the company is in times of crises; employees’ physical, emotional and financial health; and the company’s overall impact on its community.

Companies also need to employ at least 1,000 employees to be considered for the list.

The results: A strong link surfaced between positive employee opinion and how senior leaders and direct managers responded to the COVID-19 crisis. In fact, 71 percent of workplaces on this year’s list scored better than in pre-pandemic years.

In a typical year, 75 percent of a company’s score is based on confidential employee feedback, while the remainder is the company’s response to an essay question focused on programs and practices. This year, however, the essay question focused on actions taken in response to the challenges of 2020.

These companies managed “not just to muddle through” the pandemic, according to Fortune’s release, but also to become “role models” for other businesses.

Read more about the 2021 methodology.

See this year’s full list of 100 Best Companies To Work For.