Nominate your employer as a 2022 Hearst CT Top Workplace

As we finally head back to normal times after two years of the coronavirus pandemic, one constant worry is more intense than ever: Companies struggle to find the right employees as workers look very closely at where they might earn a living.

It’s a tough match-up game out there, all the more with the unemployment rate falling back to pre-pandemic levels. How can a business gain an advantage?

If you’re hiring, one of the most effective claims you can make is that you’re a Top Workplace.

That means the Hearst Connecticut Media Top Workplaces awards for employers in Fairfield, New Haven and Litchfield counties. We’re now starting our 12th year, a great time for anyone who’s hiring — privately owned businesses, nonprofits, publicly traded corporations, even government agencies — to showcase all the ways they’ve valued employees throughout the coronavirus crisis.

Nominations are open for the 2021 competition.

Ask Maria Coutant Skinner what it has meant for the combined company where she is CEO, McCall Center for Behavioral Health and Help Inc., the mental health and addiction services nonprofits in Litchfield County and the Waterbury area.

“With employees having many options of where they want to go to work,” CEO Coutant Skinner said, “We point it out.”

Companies say the recognition works for recruitment, it works for the information they receive through employee surveys and it works for morale — at a tough time.

“Like many workplaces, especially in the healthcare field, we experienced heart wrenching challenges, but our staff never faltered with their unwavering commitment and dedication to their colleagues and clients,” said Coutant Skinner, at the two nonprofits that are merging this year.

She tells a story about last month’s peak of the omicron variant, when upwards of 20

percent of the staff — herself included — was sick or unable to work. “every person who wasn’t sick stepped in,” she said, including the director of outpatient services flipping pancakes for residential clients.

Top Workplaces celebrates that spirit. We’re looking to honor the best places to work, regardless of what kind of employers they are. A company need not have its headquarters here to compete.

The contest is open to any employer with 35 or more people in the three counties. Recognition is given for small, midsize and large organizations, and the contest also rewards the best executives — including Coutant Skinner, last year’s midsize winner.

Don’t wait, nominations close Friday, March 11. The cost to compete — and win — is zero.

Last year, Hearst Connecticut Media honored 56 employers from across the region. Awards are based on short, 24-question employee surveys by our partner, Energage, about how well employers value their ideas, communicate, puts their strategies to work, operate ethically and create a culture of teamwork and competence.

The currently reigning top winners from 2021 include Berkshire Hathaway HomeServices New England Properties (1st place among large employers for the fourth consecutive year), and Bridgewater Associates at No. 2 for the large size category. Gaylord Specialty Healthcare was No. 3 among large employers.

For midsize employers, Splash Car Wash won the top spot after many years of coming close. No. 2 was High Watch Recovery Center and No. 3 was HAI Group, a specialty insurer to housing authorities, based in Cheshire.

Criterion, a small but global software developer in Norwalk, won 1st place among small employers for the second time in its two years in the contest. Autism Behavioral Health, a Danbury company, was No. 2 among small employers for the second straight year. The Star Supply Co. of New Haven was No. 3.

Only one company, ICON International Inc., the corporate barter firm based in Greenwich, has made the winners list all 11 years. All of these winners, and all 56 from the 2021 list, have amazing stories to tell about working through coronavirus. And they can tell you why their Top Workplaces designation matters.

Hearst Connecticut Media Top Workplaces winners will be featured in the Connecticut Post, The News-Times of Danbury, Greenwich Time, The Stamford Advocate, The Norwalk Hour, New Haven Register and The Register Citizen of Torrington in September — and will be highlighted on all of the associated websites.

For complete coverage of last year’s winners, go to any of those media outlets’ websites and type /topworkplaces — such as www.ctpost.com/topworkplaces.

Energage carries out the Top Workplaces surveys for more than 40 metro newspapers including some of the biggest. The company has surveed more than 20 million employees at tens of thousands of organizations.

Energage launched its Top Workplaces USA designation in 2022, with the best of the best winners that have at least 150 employees. McCall/Help and several of our other 2021 winners made that national list this month.

Employers can be nominated online at https://topworkplaces.com/ nominate/hearstct or by calling 203-6170727.