Here’s What You Missed at Glassdoor’s Best Places to Work Tour - Glassdoor for Employers
2018 02 27 Glassdoor Best Places to Work

Here's What You Missed at Glassdoor's Best Places to Work Tour

What does it take to become one of the Best Places to Work? That was the question on the minds of every attendee at Glassdoor’s Best Places to Work Tour, a half-day event dedicated to helping employers unlock the secrets to recruiting top talent and building amazing cultures. And on a chilly but sunny day at the Nasdaq Entrepreneurial Center in San Francisco, employers from all over the country gathered to learn the answer.

Through a series of interviews, panels and presentations, attendees came to understand what the Best Places to Work have in common, how they received this recognition and what tips they had for others hoping to join them on the list — here are a few highlights.

What It Takes to Become a Best Place to Work

Glassdoor strives to make Best Places to Work the most authentic workplace awards out there, and as such, we have a robust methodology in place to ensure the highest level of data and reviews integrity. In this livestream exclusive, Glassdoor’s Head of Awards Scott Dobroski delved into that methodology. A few things viewers learned:

  • Unlike other workplace awards, you don’t have to pay a fee or submit an application to be considered eligible
  • The Best Places to Work are chosen based on employee feedback in Glassdoor reviews
  • Glassdoor takes quantity, quality and consistency of reviews into account when determining winners

Want to learn more about what it takes to become one of the Best Places to Work? Read here.

2018 02 27 Glassdoor Best Places to Work

How Facebook Recruits and Retains

Best Places to Work Tour host JP Mangalindan, Chief Tech Correspondent for Yahoo Finance, sat down with the VP of HR and Recruiting Director at Facebook — the #1 Best Place to Work —  for an insight-packed conversation on how they not only bring candidates through the door, but also ensure they stick around for the long haul. And don’t worry — you don’t have to have Facebook’s recruiting budget or headcount in order to implement them at your own company.

A few tips Facebook shared:

  • Unstructured Interviews Lead to Bias: Plan which questions you’ll ask in advance, educate yourself on unconscious bias in interviews and train hiring managers on how to conduct an A+ interview.
  • Engaged Employees Stay Longer: Employees should love at least 70 percent of what they do — any less, and they often get bored and want to move on. Make sure you let them follow their interests, even if that means allowing a lateral move to a different role or team.
  • Diversity Requires a Multi-Pronged Approach: There’s no quick fix for increasing diversity at your company, so you have to use multiple strategies. A couple things Facebook does is recruit at a wide range of schools (over 300, in fact) and intentionally foster an inclusive environment.

[Related: The Employee Retention Playbook]

2018 02 27 Glassdoor Best Places to Work

Being a Best Place to Work Pays Off — Literally

You probably already knew that earning a spot on the Best Places to Work list can be a boon for recruiting, but did you know that it could actually drive your bottom line? Glassdoor Chief Economist Dr. Andrew Chamberlain presented a series of studies showing the financial impact of a Best Places to Work win.

One study found that companies with increasing Glassdoor ratings outperformed those with declining ratings by .74 percent per month. Another found that Best Places to Work winners outperformed the S&P 500 by 122 percent, while the lowest-rated companies underperformed the S&P 500 by 29.5 percent.

So how exactly do you improve employee satisfaction in order to reap those financial gains? Focus on three key areas, Chamberlain recommends: culture and values, senior leadership and career opportunities.

2018 02 27 Glassdoor Best Places to Work

Recruiting Secrets of the Best Places to Work

The first step to creating a great company culture: hiring the right people. But what exactly can you do to find those people? Best Places to Work winners REI, Kimpton and Zoom Video Communication shared a few best practices for helping to find the best of the best.

Here’s what they had to say:

  • Referrals Are Key: Make sure to build out a strong referral program, as candidates who are referred by existing employees tend to be higher-performers and a better fit.
  • Avoid the Application Blackhole: If there’s one thing that candidates can’t stand, it’s being kept in the dark after they submit their application. Acknowledge that you received their application, and update candidates on their status promptly at each step.
  • Keep it Modern, Human and Personalized: Three of the biggest mistakes recruiters can make are not staying current, forgetting about the human touch and not delivering a white-glove experience to candidates.

2018 02 27 Glassdoor Best Places to Work

Words of Wisdom From an HR Rebel

To close out the day, Patty McCord — former Chief Talent Officer at Netflix and author of the new book Powerful: Building a Culture of Freedom and Responsibility — joined Glassdoor CEO Robert Hohman on stage. Embodying her commitment to radical honesty, McCord pulled no punches as she dished on her time at Netflix, how she built their famous culture guide and which outdated HR practices need to be kicked to the curb.

A sample of McCord’s advice:

  • Always Ask Why: Too many HR practitioners do things just because others do. Before implementing processes or policies, challenge yourself to identify what purpose it serves for your organization.
  • Cut the HR Speak: HR folks often try to dance around delicate issues, but McCord advises facing them head-on. Practice being direct in tough situations — your employees will thank you.
  • #MeToo Is On All of Us: In order to truly eradicate harassment and inequality, every single person at a company is responsible for standing up for their colleagues and calling out bad behaviors when they see them.

Of course, these are just a few of the top-level takeaways from the half-day event. If you want to hear even more insight and advice, register here to download the video recordings of our livestream. And make sure to join us in September for Glassdoor Recruit, our marquee conference dedicated to helping employees hire truly informed candidates at scale.