Best Places to Work 2015 Madison Magazine

Best Places to Work 2015: Step inside the twenty-six highest-ranking workplaces in the Madison area and see why employees love them

Madison Magazine, October 2015

This package I wrote is broken into several different articles online, starting with the main introduction piece, followed by individual profiles on nine of the 26 winners: Domestic Abuse Intervention Services, Edward Jones, Kromrey Middle School, Acumium, The Employer Group, Steve Brown Apartments, Community Support Network, Widen Enterprises, and Safe Bridge Solutions. Business writer Judy Dahl of JKD Communications pulled together additional mini-profiles and my editor, Shayna Mace, filled in and worked overtime on this one for sure.

None of us had anything to do with picking the winners; Nebraska-based Quantum Workplace took care of that with an extensive, 60-question survey measuring key engagement categories including team effectiveness, trust in senior leaders, feeling valued, manager effectiveness, compensation, benefits, individual contribution, trust in coworkers, job satisfaction and retention. My job was simply to visit some of the winners and tell about what I saw.

This was my fourth (fifth?) Best Places to Work story package for Madison Magazine and, I have to say, it’s a good thing I already believe I have my dream job. Every time I visit companies for this story, I leave wanting to work at at least one of them. No doubt about it, no matter what the industry or flavor, there are clear key ingredients the winners all share. When I get a little space and time to remember why I freelance, I still find it enlightening to give my own work a review through this filter. This process helps me clarify what I’m doing, what I want to be doing, and why. I love Madison. I love living in this area. And so I find it encouraging that there are employers out there who are getting it right at work, in turn helping to make this a better place to live for all of us.

—Maggie Ginsberg is an award-winning freelance writer in Madison, Wisconsin