Great Place to Work® Announces the 2021 World’s Best Workplaces™

19 October 2021 – Great Place to Work® and Fortune Magazine announced the 2021 World’s Best Workplaces™, a massive, data-led analysis of company culture around the globe. These 25 global leaders were selected from 10,000 companies, representing the voices of 19.8 million employees in 106 countries. This is the largest annual global survey of employee opinions ever.

The 25 World’s Best Workplaces stood out for creating globally exceptional employee experiences. These companies outperformed the competition with their unique and special benefits, robust training opportunities for professional development, and commitment to employee recognition and appreciation.

To be considered, companies must be identified as outstanding global employers by appearing on at least five Best Workplaces™ lists in Asia, Europe, Latin America, Africa, North America, or Australia.

“The World’s Best Workplaces are the most sweeping and consistent examples of inclusive company cultures we’ve ever known,” said Michael C. Bush, Global CEO of Great Place to Work.

“In a global workforce, alignment is everything, and these companies are fortifying their culture around the world — a nearly impossible feat. Even when tested by the pandemic, these companies recognize sub-communities in each region and their leaders carry an equitable employee experience across cultures. A huge congratulations to the World’s Best in 2021.”

Topping this year’s ranking of the World’s Best was transportation and logistics giant DHL Express, which secured 47 national list awards spanning five continents. Technology firm Cisco ranked second on the 2021 list with 22 national list awards, and hotelier Hilton placed third with 21 national list awards.

The World’s Best Workplaces range across industries, with information technology, professional services, biotechnology, and pharmaceuticals making up nearly half of the winners.

New to the list this year is biotech firm Amgen and software company Atlassian. There are ten re-entries in the top 25 companies — workplaces that appeared on past lists but didn’t make it in 2020, including pharmaceutical company Novo Nordisk, which was last named to the list in 2015.

This year proved to be enormously competitive; compared to 2020’s results, employees scored their workplaces higher on all 60 survey statements in 2021 — a notable achievement after a year of workplace challenges amid the pandemic.

Compared to other workplaces, employees at the World’s Best are 17% more likely to say they have unique benefits. Employees at the World’s Best are also 16% percent are more likely to believe pay is fair and 14% more likely to say they have training and professional development opportunities.

Employees at the World’s Best are also more likely to be involved in company innovation, as calculated through Great Place to Work’s Innovation Velocity Ration (IVR). IVR describes an organization’s ability to quickly harness, mobilize and respond to new information and ideas. IVR is the ratio of employees working in conditions that enable innovation versus the number of employees who are not. At the World’s Best Workplaces, the IVR is 7.2, meaning for every seven employees able to innovate, only two are experiencing friction. At other organizations, that drops to 5.2.

Globally, over 90% of employees at the World’s Best say they have a sense of pride in their work, that management is honest and ethical, and that they feel good about the ways the company contributes to the local community.

Slight regional variations could be seen, highlighting differences in company culture around the world. In Asia, the Best Workplaces demonstrated an outstanding commitment to honesty and transparency from management, as well as warm, welcoming work environments. Latin America’s Best Workplaces scored high on opportunities for professional development and trust in leadership. And in the U.S., employees at Best Workplaces versus other organizations were 15.6 times more likely to say their company was a great place to work when it showed a commitment to social responsibility during the pandemic.

View the top 25 World’s Best Workplaces in 2021.