Top Companies 2021: City Edition

Workers are looking to hit the reset button. Over the past year and a half, professionals from all over the U.S. have begun to re-evaluate where and how they make a living. It’s been dubbed ‘The Great Resignation’ and ‘The Great American Migration of 2020,’ among a host of other buzzy phrases. But they all point to the same core trend: People across the U.S. are looking for a change of scenery, at work and in life overall.

Workers who were originally “sheltering in their job” through much of the pandemic have realized that they now have considerable power in today’s tightening labor market. Many are taking advantage of this position of strength, opting to be choosy about what they do next. Some are quitting a job to start their own business, others are making sure they put their priorities first when deciding which company to work for.

That’s why we’re excited to launch a new version of the LinkedIn Top Companies franchise: City Edition. These lists look at the best workplaces to grow your career in 10 cities throughout the U.S.: Atlanta, Austin, Boston, Charlotte, Chicago, Cincinnati, Cleveland, Dallas, Minneapolis and Seattle. Each of these cities is attracting a growing number of job seekers — and the companies highlighted in our lists are heeding the call to put workers first.?

Bank of America (No. 1 in Charlotte) has committed to raising its minimum wage to $25. Massachusetts General Hospital (No. 2 in Boston) introduced new ways to support its staff, including a buddy system and “going home checklist” to help frontline workers transition from work to home life. And Home Depot (No. 1 in Atlanta) has ramped up its employee benefits, adding more paid time off, doubling overtime pay for hourly workers and offering unlimited access to mental health counseling.

To put together our City Edition ranking, we measured seven pillars that demonstrate that companies are investing in their workforce: ability to advance, skills growth, company stability, external opportunity, company affinity, gender diversity and educational background. Each pillar is measured using unique LinkedIn data for employees in the greater metropolitan area. While these are the same pillars used for our U.S. Top Companies list, the eligibility requirements for these lists are slightly different. (You can read more at the bottom of this article.)

We hope these lists will serve as a resource for those who currently live in each of these cities, as well as job seekers who are looking for a fresh start in a new locale. Wondering how to use the rankings in your job search? At each company, you can see trending skills and job titles in that city, explore open roles and connect with people you may know.

Check out this year’s #LinkedInTopCompanies in Atlanta, Austin, Boston, Charlotte, Chicago, Cincinnati, Cleveland-Akron-Canton, Dallas-Fort Worth, Minneapolis-St. Paul and Seattle.

Top Companies: City Edition Methodology

Our methodology uses LinkedIn data to rank companies based on seven pillars that have been shown to lead to career progression: ability to advance; skills growth; company stability; external opportunity; company affinity; gender diversity and educational background. Ability to advance tracks employee promotions within a company and when they move to a new company, based on standardized job titles. Skills growth looks at how employees across the company are gaining skills while employed at the company, using standardized LinkedIn skills. Company stability tracks attrition over the past year, as well as the percentage of employees that stay at the company at least three years. External opportunity looks at Recruiter outreach across employees at the company, signaling demand for workers coming from these companies. Company affinity, which seeks to measure how supportive a company’s culture is, looks at connection volume on LinkedIn among employees, controlled for company size. Gender diversity measures gender parity within a company. Finally, educational background examines the variety of educational attainment among employees, from no degree up to Ph.D. levels, reflecting a commitment to recruiting a wide range of professionals.?

To be eligible, companies must have at least 50 employees as of April 30, 2021 in the city and reductions in staff (attrition and layoffs) can be no higher than 10% (based on LinkedIn data or public announcements). While our annual Top Companies list only ranks parent companies (data on majority-owned subsidiaries are incorporated into the parent company score), the city lists separate out subsidiaries from their parent companies. All data scoring is normalized based on company size across the pool of companies eligible for the list. The methodology time frame is May 1, 2020 through April 30, 2021. All of the data used is aggregated and/or de-identified.

We exclude all staffing and recruiting firms, educational institutions and government agencies. We also exclude LinkedIn, its parent company Microsoft and Microsoft subsidiaries.