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What makes a top employer in 2021?

From the highly educated researcher to the experienced marketer and the charismatic salesperson to the motivated intern, every company wants the best and the brightest when hiring for a role. But these top candidates won’t consider just any company. To get their attention, it’s necessary to be a top employer. Don’t fret if you’re not (yet) a top employer. Courtesy of findings from the Top Employer Institute, this Pacific Prime article explains the 5 characteristics of a good employer so that you get a better understanding of how to be a top employer.

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1. Finding, instilling, and sharing a common sense of purpose across the organization

The secret ingredient to motivating employees is to ensure they can extract meaning from the work they do. This can increase productivity and profitability, as well as lower employee turnover. While a sense of purpose can stem from the industry, sector, and the impact made on surrounding communities, it can also come from the organizations’ culture – something that employers have direct control over.

As such, many top employers are paying close attention to purpose.

  • 89% of top employers actively want to reflect employees’ desire to ‘do good in the world’
  • 65% ask employees to share their views on the ethical standards of the organization
  • 93% pro-actively train employees in ‘how to live’ the company values
  • 88% evaluate staff performance against company values as part of their review

2. Harnessing the networks and networking capabilities of employees

Did you know that 45% of top employers give employees incentives to develop formal networks? This has risen 11 percentage points in the past year. The benefits of doing so are twofold. Firstly, employees could get career development opportunities through networking. Secondly, innovation is more likely when bringing together diverse groups of employees from different functions and locations.

Given that harnessing the networks and networking capabilities of employees is closely tied to diversity and inclusivity, here is how you can build a diverse and inclusive workplace:

3. Pushing employees to take ownership of their own performance management

Gone are the days of the formal annual performance review. Top employers today prefer monthly conversations between managers and employees, focusing on both performance and career development. While performance management is traditionally a top-down approach, 76% of top employers now try to ensure their employees take charge of scheduling regular ‘check-ins’, up from 67% last year.

The minutes of these meetings are not always logged in the system, which lightens the bureaucracy and maintains agility. What’s more, the feedback process is becoming more responsive to team dynamics. In other words, employees are not only getting feedback from managers, but also from peers and customers. 62% of top employers have a platform to support peer-to-peer recognition, up 13 percentage points in the past year.

Note: In fact, continuous feedback is particularly appreciated by Gen Z and Gen Y (millennial) employees. 

4. Using digital platforms to facilitate social learning and develop organizational knowledge

The COVID-19 pandemic has accelerated a digital workplace strategy. To facilitate employees’ growth and development, it’s no wonder that digital platforms and e-learning have been on the rise. Top employers take this a step further by encouraging teams to learn from each other and exchange knowledge via social networks. 75% of top employers have online communities for learning and 65% have communities of practice to support social forms of learning.

Further reading: How to develop and train soft skills in the workplace

5. Being there for employees as human beings and safeguarding their physical and mental wellbeing

In light of the COVID-19 pandemic, including the health crisis and economic uncertainty, employees are increasingly concerned about their job security and wellbeing. For top employers, the focus is also on being caring. 92% of top employers believe wellbeing is a strategic imperative for their business, up from 83% last year. The most innovative of the employers perceive wellbeing as being multidimensional, encompassing factors like:

  • Physical
  • Emotional
  • Social
  • Financial
  • And more.

Increasingly, employers are also perceiving wellbeing through a preventative lens. By allocating a percentage of their total HR budget to programs related to health and wellbeing, employers find there to be a positive impact on the general health, lifestyle, and behavior of employees. The bottom line is that productivity and image of the company rises, while absenteeism, stress, and burnout falls. Some topics covered in these wellbeing programs are:

  • Fitness
  • Nutrition
  • Mindfulness
  • Financial management
  • And more.

If return on investment (ROI) is a concern for you, here are some ways to evaluate the impact of your employee wellness programs:

Design, implement, and optimize your employee benefits offerings with Pacific Prime today!

One easy way to safeguard employees’ physical and mental wellbeing is via employee benefits. As a global health insurance brokerage and employee benefits specialist, Pacific Prime has over two decades of experience helping corporates of all sizes and industries design, implement, and optimize their employee benefits offerings using a tailored, technology-driven approach.

To learn more about the world of employee benefits and our employee benefits offerings, you’re more than welcome to arrange a free consultation!

Senior Content Creator at Pacific Prime
Suphanida is a Senior Content Creator at Pacific Prime, an award-winning global health insurance and employee benefits specialist.

With over 5 years of experience in the field, Suphanida spends the majority of her day synthesizing complex pieces of insurance-related information and translating this into easy-to-understand, engaging, and effective content across a variety of media such as articles, infographics, whitepapers, videos, and more.

Suphanida is also responsible for planning and publishing three whitepapers released annually by Pacific Prime: The State of Health Insurance Report, The Cost of Health Insurance Report, and The Global Employee Benefits Trends Report. Additionally, she handles the LinkedIn profiles of Pacific Prime’s Founder and CEO, as well as Global HR Lead.

Suphanida’s strengths lie in her strong research and analytical skills, which she has gained from her BA in Politics from the University of Warwick and Erasmus Mundus Joint MA in Journalism from Aarhus University and City, University of London.

Being of Thai-Indian origin and having lived, studied, and worked in Thailand, the UK, and Denmark, Suphanida also has a unique, multicultural perspective that helps her understand the struggles of expats and globetrotters.

Outside of work, she enjoys traveling to new places and immersing herself in different cultures.
Suphanida Thakral