Top Workplaces 2022

TAMPA BAY’S 101 TOP WORKPLACES 2022 SUNDAY, MARCH 27, 2022

THE PATH FORWARD Post-pandemic

Companies in Tampa Bay are figuring out their ‘new normal’. It’s not the same for everyone. Page 14

The 101

Did your company make the 2022 list? See who the winners are. Page 4

Got perks?

What does it take to be a Top Workplace in Tampa Bay? See what three company leaders have to say. Page 17

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TAMPA BAY’S 101 TOP WORKPLACES

Businesses work through another year of adjustments

G

oing into year three of a global pandemic, it was still unclear for most of us what the future of our workplaces would look like.

Some companies in Tampa Bay chose to return to the office as the omicron variant waned. Others shrunk their office spaces permanently, adapting to a hybrid work JUSTINE model. And many GRIFFIN still are working Editor, from home fullEconomy time, in sweatpants and Growth and with dogs in their laps.

What does the future of work look like in Tampa Bay? It’s a great question.

The 2022 Top Workplaces may be the most telling one yet. Each year, the Tampa Bay Times surveys employers in the region to get an understanding of what it’s like to work in a variety of industries, and from a number of companies, to come up with our annual ranking.

Participation in our survey boomed this year: Nearly 36,000 employees from around Tampa Bay agreed to take part in rating their places of business. From their surveys, we selected 101 employers as Top Workplaces, including 19 companies that made the list for the first time.

These employees work at highly rated nonprofits, government agencies, small businesses and

large corporations. They were eager to share their experiences with us.

The resounding trend that set employers apart from others was how flexible they were with employees during this challenging time.

PowerChord Inc., a tech company in St. Petersburg, made working from the downtown office optional for workers going forward.

“We have implemented a digital-first workforce,” said Patty Hurst, the company’s people and culture coordinator. “Employees can come into the office, or work from home. It’s their choice.”

At FACTS Engineering in New Port Richey, workers returned to the office to re-energize their creative collaboration.

“Some of our best ideas are born as we spend informal time together,” said Ronald McVety, president of FACTS Engineering.

The company plans to expand its office space to meet the needs of their growth. “(We’re) an organization of like-minded people that take pride and ownership in a company that puts team members and their families first.”

Overall, employees are expressing more positive feelings about their workplaces in 2022 compared to last year. From open-mindedness in company culture to believing in company values, we detected a jump in positivity rates in this year’s survey results.

“Our retention as well as our hiring has honestly been the best

it has ever been in the 23 years of us being in business,” said Angie Missonis, the vice president of human resources at PostcardMania, a marketing agency in Clearwater. “Our HR department has managed to keep the company afloat with personnel requirements and keep us growing.”

But we’re not out of the woods yet. Challenges lie ahead, many of our respondents noted. Housing costs are soaring in Tampa Bay, making it more difficult to recruit and for new employees to afford to live here. Some sectors in the region, including technology, have grown at a tremendous rate, meaning there’s more competition than ever. Supply-chain issues and the rising costs of inflation have pushed some companies to get creative.

“These coming months will continue to be an intense and challenging time for our industry,” said Julia Fulton, the corporate communications manager at Total Quality Logistics, a freight brokerage firm with an office in Tampa.

“We do not expect the global supply chain crisis to normalize until late 2022 or into 2023. As a company, we thrive under pressure and look at every challenge as an opportunity.”

Now, let us tell you about some of the Top 101 Tampa Bay Workplaces of 2022.

Top Workplaces top five Small

1. Precision Garage Door of Tampa Bay Sector: Home Repair Employees: 85 Years ranked: 4 2. The HOTH Sector: Search Engine Marketing Employees: 69 Years ranked: 2 3. OWT Global Sector: Government Employees: 86 Years ranked:1 4. Care Team Inc. Sector: Home Health Care Employees: 62 Years ranked: 3 5. Engel & Völkers Sector: Real Estate Franchising Employees: 62 Years ranked: 4

Midsize

Large

1. PulteGroup Sector: Home Construction Employees:188 Years ranked:4

1. KnowBe4 Inc. Sector: Security Awareness Training Employees:1,034 Years ranked: 7

2. Century 21 Beggins Enterprises Sector: Real Estate Employees: 391 Years ranked:13

2. Progressive Insurance Sector: Insurance Employees: 5,455 Years ranked: 13

3. Smith & Associates Real Estate Sector: Real Estate Employees: 333 Years ranked: 7

3. Grow Financial Federal Credit Union Sector: Financial Services & Insurance — Credit Union Employees: 553 Years ranked:11

4. Hughes Exterminators Inc. Sector: Pest Control Employees: 280 Years ranked: 2 5. Healthesystems Sector: Pharmacy and Ancillary Benefits Management Employees: 258 Years ranked: 8

4: Baldwin Risk Partners Sector: Insurance & Risk Management Employees: 507 Years ranked:10 5. Kforce Inc. Sector: Staffing Services Employees: 633 Years ranked: 6

Contact Justine Griffin at jgriffin@ tampabay.com or 727-893-8467.

Follow @SunBizGriffin.

ONLINE: More on the Tampa Bay Times’ 101 Top Workplaces at tampabay.com/topworkplaces

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TAMPA BAY’S 101 TOP WORKPLACES Rank Company

Founded

Ownership

Sector

Regional Years Locations employees on list

Consecutive years on list

Public Public Co-op/ Mutual Public Public Private Private Nonprofit Public Public Public Public Private Private Private Nonprofit Public Public Nonprofit Private Public Public

Security awareness training Insurance Financial services & insurance, credit union

1 3 23

1,034 5,455 553

7 13 11

7 13 11

Insurance & risk management Staffing services Construction Health care Credit union Banking Healthcare revenue cycle management Wireless communication Insurance and financial products Financial services Financial services & insurance Resort Cancer hospital & research center Government Financial services Hospitals & health systems Home healthcare services Property and casualty insurance Design, manufacturing know-how, supply chain/product management expertise.

Technology Retail

1 1 2 1 44 17 1 1 1 7 10 2 1 4 2 222 1 3 2

507 633 1,102 628 1,101 1,055 1,186 735 1,772 3,643 1,129 530 7,796 640 5,531 28,357 558 522 1,863

10 6 11 4 8 13 12 13 3 7 1 6 11 6 11 8 7 7 2

2 3 11 4 7 13 12 13 3 1 1 1 1 5 6 8 3 3 1

1 22

632 752

10 4

1 1

Residential mortgage servicing industry Auto dealership

3 2

650 845

6 2

1 2

Home construction Real estate Real estate Pest control Pharmacy and ancillary benefits management Residential and casualty insurance Maintenance supplies Laboratory benefit management Credit union

1 8 5 10 1 1 2 1 20

188 391 333 240 258 230 352 175 461

4 13 7 2 8 9 3 3 8

4 13 6 2 3 6 3 3 6

Healthcare software Food/beverages manufacturing Marketing Third party logistics Banking services Colocation interconnections, cloud services Law Law firm Insurance consultants & brokers Community association management Insurance Credit union Consumer goods International financial technology Hotel Software Sports and entertainment Financial services Biopharmaceuticals Employer solutions Healthcare Restaurant Rehabilitation Hospitals Financial services & insurance

1 1 1 56 12 1 2 1 1 1 1 18 1 2 1 1 1 12 1 4 1 2 16 2 2

163 195 321 322 280 237 243 238 223 185 280 407 320 282 240 299 209 208 451 375 171 242 150 465 303

2 12 10 10 4 7 13 7 1 1 13 10 1 3 9 4 6 5 5 13 2 1 2 4 1

1 12 10 2 2 7 13 7 1 1 13 10 1 1 1 4 1 3 3 13 2 1 1 4 1

Home repair Search engine marketing Government - other Home healthcare services Real estate franchising Staffing services Human and social services Healthcare technology Financial software & market trend analysis Manufacture, high tech Real estate - other Certified public accountants & consultants Business services Supplemental Medicare coverage Physicians practice Recreational education center Managed services & outsourcing Skilled nursing facilities Real estate Mortgage lending Foundation repair Full service salon and spa Information technology Design and manufacturing of industrial controls and programmable logic controllers Pest control Distribution of electronic components & inspection Human and social services Property management Financial services & insurance All lines independent insurance agency Marketing, advertising, business development, and consulting in dentistry Title & closing services Rehabilitation Title company Nonprofit Human and social services Hospitality, entertainment, recreation & travel Business services Manufacture, high tech Data analysis & research Private dental practice

15 1 1 1 3 1 1 1 1 1 N/A 1 1 1 1 1 1 1 2 1 1 1 1 1

85 69 86 62 62 52 69 50 80 85 88 59 65 63 66 79 52 84 95 88 76 62 59 54

4 2 1 3 4 1 7 1 5 13 1 3 1 1 1 6 1 2 3 1 1 9 2 1

4 2 1 1 4 1 7 1 5 13 1 3 1 1 1 6 1 2 3 1 1 1 2 1

2 1

72 110

1 5

1 5

5 1 1 2 1

64 70 103 120 50

6 9 2 6 1

3 5 2 2 1

1 18 1 2 2 1 2 1 1 1

53 140 86 128 80 56 149 137 79 69

4 5 1 4 8 1 11 5 6 5

1 5 1 3 2 1 11 1 6 5

Large (500-plus local employees) 1 2 3

KnowBe4 Inc. Progressive Insurance Grow Financial Federal Credit Union

2010 1937 1955

4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22

Baldwin Risk Partners Kforce Inc. Power Design Inc. CareCentrix Suncoast Credit Union Capital One Financial Corporation Parallon - Tampa Shared Services T-Mobile US MetLife USAA The Auto Club Group TradeWinds Island Resort H. Lee Moffitt Cancer Center & Research Institute Hillsborough County Aviation Authority Raymond James Financial, Inc. BayCare Health System Pinnacle Home Care Heritage Property & Casualty Insurance Company Jabil

2011 1962 1989 1996 1934 1994 1999 1999 1868 1922 1916 1957 1986 1945 1962 1997 2003 2012 1966

23 24

ConnectWise Aldi

1982 1976

25 26

Nationwide Title Clearing, Inc. Crown Automotive Group

1991 1969

Parent Co-op/ Mutual Private Private

Midsized (150-499 local employees) 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

PulteGroup CENTURY 21 Beggins Enterprises Smith & Associates Real Estate Hughes Exterminators, Inc. Healthesystems American Integrity Insurance Group Chadwell Supply Avalon Healthcare Solutions GTE Financial

1956 1992 1969 1964 2002 2006 1977 2013 1935

10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26 27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34

InSync Healthcare Solutions Monin, Inc. PostcardMania Total Quality Logistics - TQL The Bank of Tampa Equinix, Inc. Banker Lopez Gassler P.A. Butler Weihmuller Katz Craig LLP Bouchard Insurance, A Marsh McLennan Agency Leland Management, Inc. SouthEast Personnel Leasing, Inc. Achieva Credit Union Wendover Art Group Wise Inc Sandpearl Resort LLC Ceridian HCM Tampa Bay Lightning Fifth Third Bank Bristol Myers Squibb FrankCrum DataLink Software Panda Restaurant Group PT Solutions Physical Therapy HCA Florida South Shore Hospital HealthPlanOne

2014 1912 1998 1997 1984 1998 2008 1979 2009 1997 1986 1937 2007 2011 2007 1932 1992 1858 1845 1981 2001 1973 2003 1982 2006

Public Private Private Private Private Private Private Private Co-op/ Mutual Private Private Private Private Private Public Private Partnership Public Private Private Nonprofit Private Private Private Public Private Public Public Private Private Private Partnership Public Private

Small (50-149 local employees) 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24

Precision Garage Door of Tampa Bay The HOTH OWT Global Care Team Inc. Engel & Völkers Velocity Resource Group Senior Connection Center, Inc. Immertec Vantagepoint AI, LLC DITEK Corp Ideal Agent Spoor Bunch Franz Inside Sales Solutions Elite Insurance Partners Bluestone Physician Services Barbizon Modeling and Acting Data-Tech Mission Health Communities American Landmark Apartments FBC Mortgage, LLC LRE Foundation Repair J.CON Salon and Spa PowerChord FACTS Engineering

2007 2010 2010 1988 2005 2001 1981 2017 1979 1988 2016 1971 2010 2014 2006 1939 1996 2006 2016 2005 1989 1978 2001 1987

Private Parent Private Private Private Private Private Private Private Private Private Private Private Private Private Private Private Private Private Private Private Private Private Private

25 26

HomeTeam Pest Defense NAC Group Inc.

1996 1996

Public Private

27 28 29 30 31

Bay Area Youth Services, Inc. Robbins Property Associates Corestream Wallace Welch & Willingham Progressive Dental Marketing

1982 2009 2006 1925 2009

Nonprofit Private Parent Private Private

32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41

RELTCO Optimal Performance and Physical Therapies ClearEdge Title Arbitration Forums, Inc. Success 4 Kids & Families The Sports Facilities Companies CBIZ Leader Tech, Inc. Maxar Klement Family Dental

2013 2009 2012 1943 2005 2003 1996 1985 2017 1979

Private Private Private Private Private Private Public Public Public Private

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TAMPA BAY’S 101 TOP WORKPLACES | SMALL COMPANY SPOTLIGHT

In this family business, they all know the drill

Klement Family Dental emphasizes a team atmosphere as employees work to win over patients who don’t like going to the dentist.

BY SUE CARLTON

Times Staff Writer

ST. PETERSBURG — Not long ago, Olivia Oldham announced what she wants to be when she grows up: “ ‘A tooth doctor,’ ” reports her grandmother, Beth Klement.

Olivia is 6, so she has some time to think about it. But if the career path sticks, it would be the next generation to carry on the Klement Family Dental legacy.

Created in 1979 after Tom Klement finished dental school and joined his already-practicing brother Bill Klement, the business now has nearly 70 employees, with eight dentists between two St. Petersburg offices. The practice’s watchwords are “caring, comfortable and convenient,” with expanded hours and mindfulness about those who dread dental visits.

“We also don’t take it personally when somebody says ‘I hate you people,’” said Jill Schulman, a 19-year employee who worked her way up from dental assistant to clinical supervisor.

“A lot of times when people come to the dentist, they’re really afraid. People will say ‘I’d rather have a baby than go to the dentist,’” said Beth Klement, the practice’s chief executive officer. “So I love it when people say ‘I used to hate going to the dentist.’ They’ve overcome their fears, and I love it.”

In 1988, she was finishing her Ph.D. (dissertation topic: stress and dentists) when her husband Tom Klement asked if she could come in and help out at the front desk until he found someone. “We ended up working together for 31

years,” she said. “Together, his skill set and my skill set, we made a great team.”

She called her husband “a true visionary” with an eye for industry trends. He was an early adopter of expanded hours, and today they open early, have evening appointments and offer Saturday hours so people don’t have to miss work or school.

Longtime patient Libby Barr remembers how she used to jokingly grab Dr. Klement’s tie as he worked on her, telling him, “You hurt me, I’ll hurt you.”

“He was a lot of fun,” she said.

When Tom Klement died in 2019 at 66, longtime patients and vendors attended his funeral.

Today, three of Tom and Beth Klement’s children are in the family business: Dentists Kristen Klement Oldham and Stephen Klement, and chief operating officer Katherine Childs.

The goal is a team-oriented office. At monthly meetings, birthdays and work anniversaries are recognized with a shout-out, flowers, cake and a gift. The Employee of the Month gets to spin a wheel to win a prize — a dinner out, or maybe a prime parking spot.

Employees can collect small bonuses of $5 or $10 for going the extra mile, like helping a patient with a toothache get seen quickly.

“Everybody loves those little white envelopes when they come out,” Schulman said.

“We try to make most days fun,” Beth Klement said.

Schulman points to frequent training and growth opportunities as office positives.

The practice emphasizes what

Photos by MARTHA ASENCIO-RHINE | Times

Tiffany Rohten, a hygienist at Klement Family Dental in St. Petersburg, works with a patient Feb. 28.

KLEMENT FAMILY DENTAL

Private dental practice Locations: Two in St. Petersburg Employees: 69 Website: www.stpetedentist.com/

EMPLOYEE COMMENTS • “I feel like it’s not a job. It feels like family.”

• “I get to wake up and do what I enjoy doing for a living.”

Patient coordinators Bryana Mitchell, left, and Savannah Reardon work together at Klement Family Dental.

they call “same-days” — procedures that get done in a single visit so patients don’t have to return.

Shulman said when her husband died in December, the office sent food, supplies, cards — “anything I needed, they were there and it was sincere and I knew they really meant it. That’s a family.”

For several years before the pandemic hit, the practice participated in a nonprofit program called Dentistry from the Heart, intended to help people who can’t afford dental care. On a designated day, any adult could come

in for a free cleaning, filling or extraction.

People would take multiple buses to get there. One woman who needed a tooth pulled came the afternoon before. Some came every year. “That was kind of amazing and humbling at the same time,” Beth Klement said.

“We probably saw 150 to 200 patients in a day. It was our favorite day of the year.”

These days, they see patients who came in as kids bringing in their own children.

Longtime patient Dave Rister

• “I love our patients and that we are committed to great patient care.

We love our team members and want to create a great and caring work environment for them. We are always seeking to improve our processes and work environment.” remembers Klement kids running around at the office — the ones who work there now.

“Nobody likes to go to the dentist,” he said. “But we really enjoy them.”

“You know the TV show Cheers?

Everybody knows your name kind of thing?” said Barr. “It’s kind of like that.”

Contact Sue Carlton at scarlton@ tampabay.com. Follow @SueCarltonTimes

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TAMPA BAY’S 101 TOP WORKPLACES

Quick action mitigated supply-chain issues

BY JAY CRIDLIN

Times Staff Writer

For Ron McVety, the supply-chain slowdown of 2021 wasn’t just a series of TV images of empty store shelves and ships backed up off the California coast.

It was a real threat to his New Port Richey business.

“Our company’s 35 years old, and we’ve never seen anything like it,” said the CEO of Facts Engineering. “Nobody I know in this industry has ever seen anything like it.”

Facts Engineering, which has just over 50 employees, was among the small businesses most reliant on the supply chain in this year’s Top Workplaces rankings. The company manufactures and distributes products used in automation in factories and other facilities “where a consumer product wouldn’t work, but a military product would be overkill,” McVety said.

Facts imports both raw materials and finished goods for manufacture and assembly in Tampa Bay, including circuit boards that came into short supply during the pandemic. Had it not acted early, it might be in trouble today.

“When COVID-19 first started in March of 2020, a lot of companies were laying off; everybody was really concerned when demand for products went down,” McVety said. “We said we’re not laying anybody off. We’re a critical company to maintain the fight against COVID because our products are used in power plants, dam automation, a lot of food processing.

People are making toilet paper. So we’re not going to lay anybody off.”

Facts kept ordering and stockpiling inventory beyond their target for the year. McVety’s philosophy: “Just build everything we can,” he said. “We want to keep everybody busy, and want everybody to keep their jobs.”

To do that, small businesses had to act quickly. When he started seeing potential signs of a slowdown, Jim Rapp, founder of fellow Top Workplaces honoree Precision Garage Door of Tampa Bay, “took several million dollars and increased our inventory so I had enough inventory for the next six

months to a year,” Rapp said.

“I had to buy two other buildings to put it in,” he said. “I had to dig pretty deep into my personal wallet to make sure we never run out of parts. But everybody else has run out of parts. Our competitors, unfortunately, didn’t have the resources or the inclination to do it.”

McVety and Facts made a few switches to keep a steady stream of products in stock, such as switching delivery of some products from ships to UPS. The cost was expensive, he said, “but we’re getting it much faster, and it’s more reliable than boats.”

One thing McVety tried not to do was pass that added cost onto his workforce. Just as the cost of doing business was rising all over the world, he could see prices rising at grocery stores and gas pumps. So Facts gave all employees a 5 percent raise, in addition to swallowing a 12 percent rise in the cost of health care for all employees and their families.

Photos by DOUGLAS R. CLIFFORD | Times

Warehouse logistics manager Charles Woods receives inventory March 3 in the raw materials warehouse at Facts Engineering’s facility in New Port Richey.

At left, Facts solder specialist Hoa Nguyen builds a circuit board for an analogue output module to be used in an automated assembly line.

But not everything that helped get Facts through the supply chain crisis happened last year.

A few years ago, Facts implemented new leadership training programs designed to make employees feel they were part of an “owner-independent company” — a place where teams could work to solve problems together from

the ground up, rather than the top down. A place where “you don’t want any single person to be a point of failure,” McVety said.

That training, he said, paid off during what might otherwise be a supremely stressful time, between a lack of product availability and a rise in demand from customers.

And it happened years before the

pandemic even started.

“The best thing I can say is, one of our senior engineers said, ‘I feel like I’m getting twice the work done in half the time with no stress,’” McVety said. “That sounds like a miracle pill, but it really works. I think it’s one of the reasons we have such a resilient workforce. And I think it’s the reason we didn’t lose anybody during this period of time.”

Contact Jay Cridlin at cridlin@ tampabay.com or 727-893-8336.

Follow @JayCridlin.

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TAMPA BAY’S 101 TOP WORKPLACES | SMALL COMPANY SPOTLIGHT

Modeling company poised for success The Tampa-based Barbizon USA runs 125 Barbizon schools across the country.

BARBIZON USA

Modeling, acting and personal development program Location: Tampa Employees: 79 in Tampa, 150 globally Website: www.barbizonmodeling.com

BY SUE CARLTON

Times Staff Writer

TAMPA — On workdays around 5 p.m., Barbizon USA’s director of corporate training Kim Flores knows not to make phone calls.

Because it’s about to get loud.

That’s when the bookers — employees who spend afternoons and evenings phoning young people who signed up for Barbizon’s modeling, acting and personal development classes — put aside their headsets and rise from their workstations.

There in the bookers’ room, the lights dim, a disco ball starts to twirl and a dance video is projected on a wall for participants to follow. On a recent afternoon, it was Barry White’s You’re The First, The Last, My Everything that got them moving, followed by a Kung Fu Fighting encore. They laughed, clapped, and went back to work.

“You can hear it anywhere in the building,” said Flores. “Even though you’re not in there dancing, it still makes you smile.”

Barbizon’s modeling training has been around for more than 80 years, once sporting the memorable tagline: “Be a model, or just look like one.” (The newest version: “Let your star shine.”)

Today, from its Kennedy Boulevard offices across from the WestShore Plaza mall, Barbizon USA manages 125 of the training facilities nationwide, including its own in Tampa.

The company’s more than 60 employees are predominantly women — and women comprise the managing executive team. “It’s just a very empowering place,” Flores said.

Hallways are lined with giant glamor shots. Students walk a runway with floor-to-ceiling windows and apply cosmetics under hot lights in the make-up rooms. They learn everything from posture and voice and diction to skin care and

EMPLOYEE COMMENTS

• “I am passionate about what we do for young teens. We give them a program that helps their self esteem and develops them in to being the best they can be.”

• “I do believe we help kids with our training program. My income and potential starts and ends with me and the ambition and hard work I put into it.”

• “The fun and loving environment each team member contributes to.

Each new day is fresh and exciting here.”

Photos by ARIELLE BADER | Special to the Times

From left, Amyah Calderon, Cara Naylor and Elsa Hoven participate in the booking department’s daily dance break Feb. 22 at Barbizon’s Tampa headquarters.

resume writing.

In the 1980s, Barbizon found potential clients through TV and radio ads, and in the 1990s, reached out to young people at shopping malls and movie theaters. As with all businesses, and particularly in pandemic times, the playing field has changed.

“In a post-COVID world, a lot of our efforts are focused on a digital platform,” said Barbizon USA’s chief operating officer Laura LaBelle. Barbizon still has a mall presence in some larger markets and works events — recently, the Florida State Fair — but probably 80 percent of new client inquiries “come from a digital space,” LaBelle said.

That means connecting with young people through TikTok, Instagram and Google, and for parents, Facebook. There are Zoom auditions and orientation before in-person training starts. Clients are 8 to 18, and while many have their sights set on acting, modeling or both, others just want to be able to step in front of a classroom with poise and confidence, Bar-

The make-up room, with its glamour shots and hot lights, is where students prepare before walking the runway.

bizon employees say. Classes are 48 hours of in-person training on weekends for six months and cost about $50 an hour.

Some who apply to work there are Barbizon graduates themselves. Some were employed at Disney or played in rock bands.

“I like the diversity,” said Flores,

who has experience in modeling, dancing and pageants and holds bachelor’s and master’s degrees in education. “Everyone kind of comes from a different part of the world in this industry, and it just kind of works.”

One Barbizon graduate started at the company in an entry-level

job and worked her way up to be a vice president, LaBelle said.

“We’re always looking to grow our individual employees from the inside,” she said. The executive team does interviews even for entry-level jobs.

Employees — salaried or hourly, with the potential to earn bonus incentives — are considered from both a quantity and quality perspective, LaBelle said. Someone who isn’t especially productive may still do high quality work that enhances the customer experience. Both matter, she said.

“Our higher power is serving young people,” LaBelle said. “We’re all going to live in the world these young people are going to be running.”

A perk to working there: a fully stocked clothing exchange closet for employees, complete with shoes lining the floor. The company plans to move to trendy Midtown Tampa later this year.

Bottom line on what they do, Flores said: “It’s fun.”

Contact Sue Carlton at scarlton@tampabay.com.

Follow @SueCarltonTimes

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TAMPA BAY’S 101 TOP WORKPLACES | MIDSIZE COMPANY SPOTLIGHT

Sokhna Wade, a customer support specialist, listens to a colleague March 9 at Wise Inc.’s office in Tampa.

Wise finds path to happiness is a generous time-off policy

BY JAY CRIDLIN

Times Staff Writer

Shannon Raisor was crushed when her Papillon named Chester died unexpectedly last year.

So crushed that she asked for bereavement leave from her job at Wise Inc., a global currency transfer company with nearly 350 employees in Tampa.

“Some people would be like, ‘It’s your dog,’” said Raisor, a senior customer support team leader. “But for me, my dogs are everything to me.

So I was able to mourn and recuperate from that loss.”

Six months later, another blow: Raisor learned her grandmother

Photos by ARIELLE BADER | Special to the Times

was dying from cancer. Once again, Wise urged her to take paid leave as needed.

“I was able to drop everything and go to her before she even passed,” Raisor said. “It’s had a tremendous impact for me to be able to take that time and those moments where it’s so critical for well-being.”

Welcome to the workplace at Wise.

Over the last two years, more companies have boosted benefits and adjusted workplace expectations to help attract and retain employees post-pandemic, often offering flexible work hours and

more paid time off.

Few companies have taken that approach to heart like Wise.

Starting with the basics: Employees get 25 standard personal days, 15 sick days and 11 holidays — including a new one, Juneteenth, added this year.

The company then offers new parents 18 weeks of parental leave, including two added this year, well above the 12 weeks afforded to federal workers in the United States. Wise this year also added 10 days of leave in the event of a pregnancy loss, plus five days for bereavement or caregiving,

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TAMPA BAY’S 101 TOP WORKPLACES | MIDSIZE COMPANY SPOTLIGHT WISE

continued from 11Y dubbed “compassionate leave.”

On top of all that, the company also gives employees three “me days” to do whatever they like, one day to volunteer for the cause of their choices, and — the pièce de résistance — a six-week paid sabbatical, with bonus, after four years with the company.

If you’re counting along, that’s 190 possible days of allowable paid time off. More than half a calendar year.

“A lot of the feedback we’ve gotten from candidates or on offer calls is like, ‘This is too good to be true. Are you sure this is part of my package?’” said Candace Smith, Wise’s people operations lead for the Americas in Tampa.

“No. This is completely included.

Take care of yourself, and we’ll take care of you.”

Wise’s approach flies in the face of traditional workplace expectations, especially in the United States. Headquartered in Tallinn, Estonia, Wise’s policies hew more closely to global norms than those in corporate America. The extended parental leave, for example, is more akin to that offered in Europe or Asia than the United States, which has no federal law mandating time off for new children.

“Coming from corporate America, you’re frowned upon if you’re taking your regular time off,” Raisor said. “I can’t tell you how many years I spent cashing out my PTO because I never really got the opportunity to use it. Or I lost it, because for this reason, that reason or the other, I was never able to take it. Or you’re sort of guilttripped into not taking it.”

That’s not the culture at Wise.

The company, which last year went public on the London Stock Exchange, has tweaked its leave policies in response to employee surveys and its own perspective on the evolving global workplace — particularly during the pandemic, as workers shared their struggles of maintaining a healthy work-life balance while caring for children or parents, without sacrificing their career and personal growth.

“Something I’ve found, not only at Wise, is that when people feel like they are taking care of them-

Employees eat a catered lunch March 9 at the Wise office in Tampa.

Laura Lenihan and Sydney Demps chat during a zoom call in the Make it rain meeting room at Wise.

selves, and they are supported by the company, they’re going to be much happier, they’re going to be more engaged, they’re going to be more productive,” Smith said.

“And all of these things impact their desire to want to be at the company.”

The paid six-week sabbatical plays a big role in that. It

Photos by ARIELLE BADER | Special to the Times

comes with “fun money to do what they like,” Smith said, which often means traveling the world.

Employees return re-energized, sharing their life experiences, “saying they feel like a new person, they’re ready to jump right in and start a new initiative.”

“It’s worked really well in allowing people to have this reset button that they maybe hadn’t necessarily experienced before,” Smith said.

Both Smith and Raisor are looking forward to their own sabbaticals in the next couple of years.

Smith may visit family in California; Raisor is thinking “anywhere and everywhere,” but especially Asia.

“It’s almost like a job requirement — you have to have a little bit of that wanderlust,” Raisor said.

“It really does help with our global perspective, which is amazing.

We’re a global company, so that’s our target.”

WISE

Wise is a financial tech company providing services for international money transfers across a range of currencies. The company is based in Estonia, Local employees: 345 Location: Tampa Website: wise.com

EMPLOYEE COMMENTS • “I get to help other people

surrounded by other positive, like-minded individuals, and the pay and work balance are ideal for me and my new growing family.”

• “I’ve never felt more appreciated and more set up for success. ... I find myself motivated to do better work here because I love everything about my job.”

• “They allow me to be myself

without having to sacrifice who I am for the job.”

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TAMPA BAY’S 101 TOP WORKPLACES | COVER STORY

TALENT SEARCH

To attract and retain the best workers, companies add incentives: flexibility, benefits and hotel amenities in the office.

BY BERNADETTE BERDYCHOWSKI

Times Staff Writer

Elizabeth Shanahan can get a bacon, egg and cheese sandwich, clean her car with a weekly detailing service, go to yoga classes or get a massage — all from her office.

It’s some of the many perks of working for Clearwater-based marketing firm PostcardMania, which also allows well-behaved dogs in the office.

With her favorite cafe sandwich at her desk, Shanahan, a human resources recruiter, sorts through hundreds of job applications every morning.

A lot of people are moving to Florida, she said. And they want a job.

The COVID-19 pandemic has reshaped office and work culture permanently. Some companies in Tampa Bay are affected by the influx of people moving here while others are struggling with the ongoing labor

shortage. Employers that made the Tampa Bay Times 2022 Top Workplaces rankings said there’s a retention push to keep workers happy in their jobs with flexibility and benefits.

PostcardMania’s motto is to foster a “thank God it’s Monday” attitude compared to “thank God it’s Friday,” Shanahan said. Employees can work from home, but she said most come to the office.

Last year, experts forecasted that commercial real estate offerings would grow, as many companies shrunk their office needs. But “it’s really not happening,” said Jim Moler, head of office agency leasing for the commercial real estate firm JLL. Most of the available office space in Tampa Bay consists of brand new buildings that are part of larger real estate projects like Water Street Tampa and Midtown Tampa. And compa-

nies are snatching up the space quickly. A surge of tenant moveins at the end of 2021 pushed Tampa’s quarterly absorption rate to its highest level on record at more than 176,000 square feet, according to a JLL report.

Employers and landlords aren’t trying to fit as many people as possible into an office anymore, Moler said. They’re using the same footprint to add “hotel” features into the workplace, like cafes, fitness centers, ping pong tables and more shared space just to spread out.

It’s a useful recruitment tool in a tight labor market, Moler said.

“The story is all about the war for talent. It’s definitely real,” Moler said. “Keeping and attracting the best and the brightest is a challenge for companies.”

Tampa Bay has seen explosive population growth over the last decade, which only accelerated during the pandemic with remote work opportunities.

Some companies are relocating or opening new branches here.

And many Tampa Bay employers can’t get office upgrades fast enough, said Fletcher Moore, a Central Florida executive for Origin Construction. Supply chain issues and inflation make it difficult to meet the demand for workspaces to adjust for hybrid models. He doesn’t expect it to get easier any time soon.

“Early comers have already

made the move to the region,” Moore said. “That word now is getting back to all of their competitors in the rest of the country. Soon they’ll be coming.”

Some employers are choosing to limit the typical work constraints on personal life. At Ceridian, a technology firm for HR management, workers have

the year to try to use up what’s left of their vacation time. While it is a hybrid workplace, most work remotely. Employees may take up to two hours during the workday to handle life matters like doctor’s appointments.

Now other employers are looking for similar ways to provide more flexibility to their

no limits on paid time off, said Todd Simmons, the manager of the company’s St. Petersburg office. About 300 employees work in Tampa Bay for the Minneapolis-based company.

“When we removed many of those constraints, frankly, employees were free to make choices that made the most sense for them,” Simmons said.

He said employees no longer feel strapped at the end of

workers. These options help not only employees, Simmons said, they are better overall for business, too.

“These types of policies positioned us ahead of the pandemic in a way that adjusting to pandemic circumstances was far easier for us,” Simmons said.

Contact Bernadette Berdychowski at bberdychowski@tampabay.com.

Follow @bberdychowski

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TAMPA BAY’S 101 TOP WORKPLACES | COVER STORY

What’s the future of the office workplace?

One real estate firm predicts most employees will return to the traditional office setting in three to nine months.

BY PHIL MORGAN

Times Correspondent

The pandemic changed the way we worked the last two years, and Chris Steinocher believes the change for many is permanent.

“COVID-19 has allowed people to define where they want to be and how they want to work,” said Steinocher, president and CEO of the St. Petersburg Area Chamber of Commerce.

Steinocher believes some large companies are rethinking whether to bring their people back to the office completely. “They realized their employees can do the work outside of the office,” he said. “And they now have found that real estate that they’re holding onto, that investment can be used in different ways.”

Several companies have told employees that they can work from anywhere, he said. Many of them have moved to St. Petersburg.

“Our chamber is seeing and our community is seeing so many wonderful new faces,” Steinocher said.

“Their office is in New York, but they’re at our events because they want to grow their professional skills and meet other people.”

Brent Miller, managing director of the Tampa Bay market for JLL commercial real estate firm, said large corporations are adopting a hybrid model, “meaning it might look a little different in that employees might not come back five days a week.”

John Przedpelski’s company caters to those working remotely who want office space for themselves. He owns two Office Evolution franchises in Tampa. The company rents out private offices, con-

Water Street Tampa IVY CEBALLO | Times

ference rooms, co-working space and day offices.

His business, too, saw a decline in demand during the worst of the pandemic, but he said since summer it’s started to pick back up again.

“It’s really coming from two things. One, from people that were afraid to go into the office are now coming back into the office, and as well as some larger companies are creating satellite offices for their businesses for people that, they want to work from home but they don’t necessarily have the facilities to work from home, so it’s kind of a work away from home,” Przedpelski said.

JLL released a report late last year that predicts most employees will come back to the traditional office setting in the next three to nine months.

“We are finding the majority of employers are encouraging — not mandating yet, but we do believe

that will come, that the majority of the employees will be back in the office,” Miller said.

It’s beginning to happen. Miller said six months ago office occupancy in the Tampa Bay market was at about 40 percent. Now it’s more than 50 percent. And significantly, companies are still holding on to their office space. Miller said 82 percent of the office space in the Tampa Bay market has been leased.

The report stated that in the last quarter of 2021, the net absorption — the amount of square feet physically occupied minus the amount vacant — was about 365,000 square feet for the Tampa Bay region. In Tampa’s central business district, the end-of-the-year surge of tenant move-ins pushed the quarterly absorption to more than 176,000 square feet, “the highest on record.”

A lot of that demand for space is driven by new companies moving into the area.

“I would just say that the Tampa Bay market in general is seeing more activity from outside corporations now than it really ever has.

It’s almost like a poorly kept secret that’s been let out,” Miller said.

Mike DiBlasi, managing director of the Florida west coast region for CBRE commercial real estate firm, said companies are willing to pay higher rents, too. He noted that the office building that opened last summer in Water Street Tampa downtown, called Thousand & One – 1001 Water Street – is commanding the highest rents ever seen in the region, in the mid- to upper $50s per square foot.

“And companies are happily paying that rent,” he said.

Noting the benefit of workers being together, DiBlasi said the Tampa office of CBRE recently relaxed some of the restrictions on coming in, and he’s seeing a significant increase in employees coming back to the office.

“Our industry’s a team sport, and for that reason, we see a lot of our teams coming in as a whole on a daily basis because they recognize the value of being around each other to spark creative ideas, to collaborate on how to service our clients and secure new business, and those things are hard to do when you’re sitting at home and everybody’s trying to coordinate a Zoom call or making phone calls to each other all day,” he said. “Those organic conversations, if you will, that take place in an office on a daily basis, a lot of times those are the things that spark future opportunities.”

And the company tries to make it a fun environment for employees.

“We had a pretty cool event last week to kick off our year, a Disney-themed event with Mickey Mouse as a special guest,” DiBlasi said. “So I think doing things like and other ways to drive people into the office is our focus.”

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TAMPA BAY’S 101 TOP WORKPLACES | MIDSIZE COMPANY SPOTLIGHT

Wendover finds niche during pandemic WENDOVER ART GROUP

BY GABRIELLE RUSSON

Special to the Times

At a time when many companies shrank their real estate footprint or scaled back operations, a Largo-based art manufacturer did the opposite during the pandemic.

Wendover Art Group undertook a massive expansion at its main headquarters and is making acquisitions.

“We had the mindset that we were absolutely going to take it as an opportunity to make the best out of the situation. When others took a step back, we were going to be aggressive and grow,” said CEO Richard Forsyth, who was 26 in 2005 when he started leading the company that now employs more than 350 people, including three in-house artists who create original pieces.

Forsyth, now 44, said his company had “courage organizationally” which he believes separated Wendover from larger businesses that “did not make that choice and were OK with being more stagnant.”

Wendover manufactures decor that’s for sale in Pottery Barn, Crate & Barrel and other lifestyle retailers – although if you look on the back of a catalog picture, it won’t say Wendover. There’s a white label so most consumers have no idea where their wall hangings come from. Wendover also decorate spaces from hotels to doctors’ offices and more.

Wendover’s bold growth during the pandemic included spending more than $1.5 million on a new website with artificial intelligence built in that lets buyers more easily customize their artwork purchases. In October, Wendover purchased a $5.7 million, 34,000-square foot building in Hightower, North Carolina, to use as a new showroom. This month, Wendover acquired a South Carolina-based light fixtures company for an undisclosed amount. The firm is currently negotiating a collaboration with the famed Metropolitan Museum of Art for Wendover to reimagine MET pieces into something new that will be sold on Wendover’s website.

In Largo, the company is also

Founded: 2005 Employees: More than 350 Headquarters: Largo Growth: This year, Wendover is projecting revenue to be16 times higher from 2009 figures.

Website: wendoverart.com

EMPLOYEE COMMENTS

• “It allows me to be a part of some-

thing bigger than myself and to be a part of a team whose lives are directly influenced by my actions.”

• “Provides great job opportunities

for employees in a positive way. It helps employees to grow and train for a better future. They care about the ideas provided by us employees and the team leader respects and explains in an ethical and professional manner any questions I have.”

Photos by Kris Ellis Photography, courtesy of Wendover

Wendover manufactures decor that’s for sale in Pottery Barn, Crate & Barrel and other lifestyle retailers. The company is in the midst of a 70,000-square-foot expansion to increase production capacity at their Largo headquarters.

in the midst of a 70,000-squarefoot expansion to increase production capacity and add more team collaborative space at their 130,000-square-foot headquarters. The work is expected to be completed in November. Forsyth said the expansion costs millions although he declined to provide a specific figure.

During the pandemic, the Largo manufacturing site stayed busy since employees didn’t have the flexibility to work from home.

“We make things. We have to be

together. We have to collaborate,” said Forsyth.

In manufacturing, safety matters. Wendover added COVID-19 measures early in the pandemic, including mask requirements and socially distant break rooms.

The company also spent about $250,000 on bi-weekly COVID tests for employees, he said.

Forsyth also worked with a healthcare organization to make the COVID-19 vaccine accessible, so employees could get their two shots on site if they chose, although For-

syth said it wasn’t a mandate.

“We had 86 percent of our team opt in,” Forsyth said. “We were very proud of that.”

The company also hosted an on-site flu shot drive, something Forsyth said he believes more companies should do. In a time of the company’s expansion that was also riddled with stress from the pandemic, Wendover emphasized communicating with employees, so Forsyth meets with staff during weekly or bi-weekly “town visions.” Forsyth said he strives to be clear and consistent, so employees understand the company’s vision to help them work together as a team.

“We were very transparent in what was happening, what our challenges were, where we’re going, and making sure everyone

was getting the same communication,” said Forsyth.

Wendover’s growth certainly hasn’t come without challenges.

Hotels, restaurants and cruise clients have been slammed economically by the pandemic, canceling future projects and trimming fat where necessary, which often meant cutting back on areas like art. Wendover’s hospitality industry business dipped by as much as 50 percent, Forsyth said, although he is expecting a major rebound in travel and leisure sales.

Yet at the same time, the number of people purchasing art for their homes skyrocketed during the pandemic.

“That part of our business is on track this year to grow approximately 60 percent over 2019,” Forsyth said.

Marketing director Sarah Guarnizo theorized why. When people were stuck at home with government stay-at-home orders in place or working remotely, they looked around and thought, “Does this space reflect who I am and make me happy? Is it beautiful?”

The cheapest way to renovate a space is to splurge on a piece of artwork, Guarnizo said.

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TAMPA BAY’S 101 TOP WORKPLACES

Topleaders share their secrets to success

KnowBe4, PulteGroup and Precision Garage Doors of Tampa Bay all scored high marks from employees.

BY JAY CRIDLIN

Times Staff Writer

Out of the 100 Top Workplaces in this year’s Tampa Bay Times survey, three stood above the rest.

Clearwater cybersecurity firm KnowBe4 finished first in the large workplace category, for companies with more than 500 employees. Home builder PulteGroup, which is based in Atlanta but has 224 employees in its West Florida division in Riverview, finished No. 1 in the midsize category. And Clearwater’s Precision Garage Doors of Tampa Bay took top honors in the small business category, for companies with fewer than 100 workers.

To learn more about what propelled these companies to the top, we connected with the three people who lead them: KnowBe4 CEO Stu Sjouwerman, PulteGroup West Florida president Sean Strickler and Precision Garage Doors owner Jim Rapp. Here’s what they had to say. These interviews have been edited for space and clarity.

Keeping employees invested in growth In this year’s Top Workplaces rankings, KnowBe4 didn’t just rank No. 1 among Tampa Bay’s large companies. It ranked No. 1 nationwide among companies with between 1,000 and 2,500 employees.

“That really made us happy,” CEO Stu Sjouwerman said. “I’m standing on the shoulders of giants, obviously. Our corporate culture is a combination of a whole series of best practices of mostly high-tech companies over the last 30 years.”

It’s been a banner year all around for the Clearwater cybersecurity

Times (2020)

Stu Sjouwerman is CEO of KnowBe4, which placed first among large workplaces in this year’s Top Workplaces survey. It also was first nationwide among companies with 1,000 to 2,500 employees.

firm. The company launched an initial public offering last April, pulling in $175 million. It has added more than 200 “Knowsters” and acquired a California tech security company for $80 million.

It recently announced a leadership change, with co-president and chief financial officer Krish Venkataraman transitioning to a role on KnowBe4’s board of directors.

“The fact that you’re a public company requires you to put even more best practices in place,” Sjouwerman said. “That just, in our particular case, strengthens the existing best practices. It’s not necessarily a burden. It’s a lot of work, but we were already on our way to get there from the get-go.”

Can you boil it down to a creed or a mantra or philosophy of what makes KnowBe4 a good place to work?

What I’m saying every day to my whole staff is, do it right the first time, do it fast, and have fun while

you do it. That still holds. But if you would take the underlying, actual core values that this whole thing is built on, it really is radical transparency, extreme ownership and complete honesty. Those are the three pillars this whole culture is built on. That comes out in multitude of best practices, workflows, policies — the KnowBe4 way, how we do things and how we certainly also do not do things. Those are the three basic, core values.

When you went public last year, were employees able to buy into the company in any meaningful way?

The vast majority of companies that roll out restricted stock units, only give (them to) middle and top management. The rank and file just doesn’t participate. That’s not the KnowBe4 way. We decided to have every employee first be an insider. That’s already unusual to begin with. And second, we include every employee into the

RSU plan, which yearly gives them more RSUs. We are doing our level best to include every Knowster in knowing exactly what’s happening. What I’m trying to do is prevent this siloing effect, where instead of being aligned and continuing your expansion, people start turning inwards, and you get departments starting little fights with each other. That’s death for expansion and productivity. So we’re keeping all Knowsters in the know. Pun intended!

Have you been short-staffed at any point, or found it more difficult to retain employees?

In certain areas of the company, we see higher turnover. On the other hand, if you look at GlassDoor, and you look at our scores, it is also not that hard to find new staff. We do have a great reputation. If you’re a best place to work in the U.S., then people are interested and are willing to jump over.

See LEADERS, 18Y

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TAMPA BAY’S 101 TOP WORKPLACES LEADERS

or quality goals, we’re not going to be able to do that unless we have an engaged and inspired workforce.

A booming business where everyone matters

When you face an external challenge like a shortage of subcontractors, what can you really do to effect change in that area as the leader of the market?

A lot of it boils down to the relationships we have with our subcontractors. Clearly, they’re a critical component in delivering a quality home to our customers. We’ve got a trade-partner-appreciation event coming up to share a little bit about what we’re expecting this year, but also thank them and recognize them for their efforts last year. We understand there are other builders they could work for. But we want to be the builder of choice for them, and have a mutually beneficial and successful partnership.

continued from 17Y

It’s no secret that Tampa Bay’s housing business is booming. For a home builder, that could lead to such rapid growth that some employees might feel left behind.

Not at PulteGroup. Employees in our Top Workplaces survey used words like “valued,” “empowered,” “included” and “respected” to describe how their company sees them.

“I am not a number,” wrote one employee, “and my voice is heard.”

“The team has the opportunity to build a home for a family,” said Sean Strickler, president of Atlanta-based PulteGroup’s West Florida division, which stretches from Ocala to Bradenton and out to Lakeland. “It’s a tangible, real product that we take a lot of pride in. It makes every day very interesting, because our families and these customers are going to raise kids in these homes, they’re going to start families. We take a lot of pride in what we do.”

Strickler has been with PulteGroup for 28 years, including the last seven in Tampa Bay. He led the division to 20-percent growth in 2021, with 1,400 homes built — this despite supply chain and labor con-

Sean Strickler is the president of Atlanta-based PulteGroup’s West Florida division.

straints that hit the construction industry fairly hard.

Do the challenges of managing a workforce feel significantly different from this time a year ago, when we were only a year into the pandemic, coming off a very tumultuous 2020?

It feels pretty similar. It’s all about communication, sharing with your team on a frequent basis not only how you’re performing as a business, but how your approach to working in an office might be changing based on what’s going on with the pandemic. We know that if we want to reach some of our goals, whether it’s financial goals

Over the last two years, how has your approach to managing a workforce changed?

It’s focusing on ensuring that each and every employee has a development plan in place, and that our managers understand that oneon-one time that is spent discussing that particular employees’ career aspirations and growth. Everybody on the team should have a wellthought-out development plan that is revisited several times throughout the year. That is the No. 1 driver

of engagement for us, and something we’re incredibly focused on.

Making work feel like family

Jim Rapp doesn’t do interviews.

Not normally, at least. His employees are the heart of his company, Precision Garage Doors of Tampa Bay, and he wants to put them front and center as much as possible.

“I run the company as if it’s their company,” said Rapp, 70, Precision’s founder and CEO. “I just listen to what they need, and I try to supply that for them. I try to have them have the feeling, and create the reality, that they pretty much guide the company.”

Rapp started Precision Garage Doors in early 2008 after working as a builder and mortgage banker, and, after sticking out the Great Recession, built it into a regional leader in garage door installation and repair. Based in Clearwater, the company has 85 employees, and Rapp tries to see them as often as he can, organizing golf trips, providing party facilities for workers and taking workers and their families out fishing on his boats.

Said one Top Workplaces survey respondent: “I feel like I’m part of a family I never had. Management really cares about me.”

“Everybody has to win,” Rapp See LEADERS, 20Y

CARLOS MORALES | Precision Garage Door of Tampa Bay

Jim Rapp is the owner of Precision Garage Door of Tampa Bay, which for four years straight has ranked among the area’s top places to work.

How top workplaces were selected

BY BOB HELBIG

Special to the Times

The disruption of business during the COVID-19 pandemic forced employers to focus harder than ever on retaining and attracting talent. Top Workplaces celebrates the employers that are getting it right.

The heart of the Top Workplaces program is an employee survey. The 24-question survey collects feedback from those who know organizations the best: the people who work there. Employee feedback is the sole basis for determining which employers make the Top Workplaces list.

This is the 13th year employee survey company Energage has partnered with the Tampa Bay Times to identify outstanding workplaces in the Tampa Bay metro area.

“The employee experience needs to be on the mission-critical list,” said Eric Rubino, CEO of Energage.

“By giving employees a voice and showcasing an authentic culture, organizations can attract those job seekers who complement their culture. Culture drives performance.”

For 2022, 101 employers made the Tampa Bay Top Workplaces list. Energage invited more than 2,000 organizations to participate, and they were eligible provided they had 50 or more employees in the region. Most of the surveying was done between September and November of 2021. Surveys went out to more than 67,000 employees in the region, and 35,846 responded.

Employers were divided into three size groups based on the number of employees in the region, to compare feedback most fairly. Organizations that exceeded benchmark scores for each size group made the winners list. Within those groupings, organizations are ranked by the aggregate score based on the employee feedback; the more positive the employee responses, the higher the score, the higher the rank.

Energage determines special award winners for employers who have standout scores in certain areas of the survey, such as leadership, values, direction, communication, meaningfulness and benefits.

Why isn’t a particular company on the list? Perhaps it did not participate, had too few employees to qualify, or did not score high enough in the survey process. Each year, Energage disqualifies a small number of participants based on irregularities in the employee survey responses, including if employees say they were pressured into answering positively. To nominate a company for next year’s program, go to tampabay.com/nominate.

Bob Helbig is media partnerships director for Energage, an employee survey company based in suburban Philadelphia.

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TAMPA BAY’S 101 TOP WORKPLACES LEADERS

continued from 18Y said. “The customer has to win a little, the employee has to win a little, they have to make enough to live in a safe neighborhood. If I make everybody win, then usually, there will be something left for me.”

Did you learn anything from the Great Recession that you could apply to the pandemic?

What I learned was, a garage door is a necessity. A stock market event or a pandemic can create a slight delay in people’s need for services, but it doesn’t stop it. People still need to raise their garage door and go to work or the doctor or the grocery store. To me, every business is a people business, whether it’s garage doors or widgets or whatever. Every business is about people. It’s about the employees, it’s about the customers, it’s about the vendors. The product is almost irrelevant.

So in 2020, when people stopped talking in person as much, how did you keep fostering those connections?

It caused a lot of challenges. We had to stop our weekly meetings,

and that hurt morale a little bit, because they’re out in their trucks all alone. We try to get the employees together at the beginning of each day when they load up. But we got through it. They all turned on their TVs, and they all got on the internet, so we stayed in touch with our customer base that way.

Life slowed down and changed a little bit, but it didn’t stop.

Because your techs are out and about so much, how are you able to see them enough to foster a connection with them?

We have continuous conversations going on throughout the day.

They all wear headsets, and they can hear each other talk, and so even though they are all maybe 10 miles from each other, they have group talk sessions where they will listen to each other’s calls, they will ask each other questions, and it’s a live, ongoing dialogue all day long. They turn it on as they work and they can chat with their coworkers.

So it has the feel of an office?

Oh, very much so.

Contact Jay Cridlin at cridlin@ tampabay.com or 727-893-8336.

Follow @JayCridlin.

KNOWBE4

KnowBe4 focuses focused on the human element of cybersecurity by providing workforce training to help employees recognize threats like phishing and malware, and execute best practices accordingly.

Employees:1,400 Location: Clearwater Website: knowbe4.com

EMPLOYEE COMMENTS:

• “As a company we are productive but not overly serious. We can work in a serious industry without becoming humorless machines.”

• “This is the most positive group of people I have ever worked with and for. We get real work done, at lightning speed, but I truly enjoy every minute of it. The company really cares about the employees, and wants to make sure they are happy and doing well.”

• “Each day I have the ability to talk and present new and old ideas, from the mundane to the wacky, without fear. Laughter, yes, but who doesn’t enjoy a little laugh? It certainly sets the tone for the day.”

PULTEGROUP

Headquartered in Atlanta, one of the nation’s largest home builders has a robust presence in Tampa Bay. The company specializes in homes in new developments; its West Florida division built1,400 homes in 2021.

Employees in Tampa Bay: 224 Location: Riverview Website: pultegroup.com

EMPLOYEE COMMENTS:

• “I am equipped and given enough

authority to do the right thing every day.”

• “I matter. I am not a number and my voice is heard. My team is amazing and I never feel alone when facing daily struggles.”

• “Pulte treats me like an adult. I am not micromanaged but I am fully supported. My job is fulfilling and interesting every single day and my team is the best team I have ever worked with. I love working here.”

PRECISION GARAGE DOORS OF TAMPA BAY Precision Garage Doors of Tampa Bay installs and repairs garage doors across Tampa Bay. Employees:102 Location: Clearwater Website: precisiontampabay.com

EMPLOYEE COMMENTS: • “It’s like going to work with my

brothers every day. Every day we are passionate about the culture and how we take care of the customer. We get treated like we are family to the owner.”

• “We operate as a big family and feel truly cared about. All employees’ concerns are addressed and handled immediately. We are (able) to express concerns and encouraged to come up with new ideas.”

• “Positive working atmosphere.

Hugs and high fives. Golf outings, fishing, game room, koi fish, family atmosphere, appreciated. I can make a good living for my family.”

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TAMPA BAY’S 101 TOP WORKPLACES | LARGE COMPANY SPOTLIGHT

TradeWinds gears up after a needed shot in the arm

Employees say the resort’s family culture has helped them through the challenges in the last two years.

BY BERNADETTE BERDYCHOWSKI

Times Staff Writer

On busy days, when the kitchen starts backing up and wait times are dragging at the beachside restaurant of the TradeWinds Island Resort, Kaitlyn Lofgren breaks out the Rubik’s Cube.

The 22-year-old server and bartender puts the toy on diners’ tables and offers them a deal: Solve this before your food comes out and get a free appetizer.

Lofgren and a team of servers at Tradewinds came up with this idea last May, when coronavirus restrictions loosened and the Tampa Bay area saw an influx of tourists — and as many workers in the hospitality industry changed careers. The St. Pete Beach resort was short staffed then — and still is.

“This lets them know we know you’re hungry and you want to get some food but we’re doing the best we can,” Lofgren said. “It’s been pretty good and the guests like to have something to do to distract them from the longer wait.”

Staff are given authority to make decisions like this, rather than wait for approval from upper management, said TradeWinds director of training and culture development Alexis Hoffstadter. TradeWinds ranked No. 15 in large companies category in the Tampa Bay Times 2022 Top Workplaces. The resort

has 530 employees and has ranked on the list six times in a row.

Staff members who spoke with the Tampa Bay Times said the family culture of the resort has helped them through the many challenges in the last two years and they’re ready for the next big one — spring break.

“It really does feel like, from top to bottom, everybody knows your name.

They care about you. And that’s a big difference for me,” said bellman Joey Lachman, who studies finance at UniversityofSouthFlorida.

At the start of the pandemic, when Pinellas County beaches were closed to the public, TradeWinds remained open. But they laid off much of their staff — from 1,000 to about 120.

“It’s probably one of the hardest days in my tenure at this company,” said vice president of sales Terry Popelka.

The workers who stayed had to fill in other positions. Lachman went from a bellman to doing front-desk work. Lofgren said she also works banquets and weddings.

JoLynn Schultz, who was an auditor before, became the assistant manager when the RumFish Beach Resort by Tradewinds reopened.

“From the bellman to the managers to the front desk staff to the housekeepers, it’s a team effort.

We get it done,” Schultz said. “And slowly, the resources are increasing.”

Tourism rebounded in Florida when coronavirus vaccines became readily available. In the last quarter of 2021, visits to Pinellas County were up 14 percent, according to data from Visit St. Pete-Clearwater.

But it has been a struggle to find

MARTHA ASENCIO-RHINE | Times

Server and bartender Kaitlyn Lofgren checks on customers dining poolside Feb. 24 at the TradeWinds Island Resort in St. Pete Beach.

TRADEWINDS ISLANDS RESORT Category: Beach hotel Employees: 530 Location: St. Pete Beach Website: justletgo.com

EMPLOYEE COMMENTS:

• “I get to excel in an evolving company. My team is strong and allows me to grow in my career.”

• “I love what I do and I have the team behind me to help me along the way.”

• “No two days are alike. There is a new challenge everyday!”

Shannon Hodges is assistant manager of recreation at TradeWinds.

new staff, Popelka said, as many people left hospitality all together for different careers. It’s the hardest to find cooks and cleaners.

Schultz has been handing out business cards wherever she goes to find workers for the Rumfish.

If she sees great customer service elsewhere, she gives them a card and encourages them to apply for a job. She’s been able to hire a few people that way, she said.

“When Florida opened up, the demand was huge for the Gulf Coast,” Popelka said. “If you talk to any hotel up and down the beach, it was just something that I don’t think any of us expected to come

back as quickly.”

He credited the TradeWinds staff for responding quickly to that demand. Last year ended up being a record for the hotel’s revenues, Popelka said. And that was without much business travel. This is the first full spring break season since COVID-19 vaccines became available. With record tourism continuing, plus business conferences picking back up, it’s a “perfect storm,” Popelka said.

Shannon Hodges, assistant manager of recreation, said she’s training a team of 40 people to be ready in time for the peak season.

Fifteen people joined the team in

the last few weeks.

In addition, Hodges is preparing the zipline, paddleboards, kayaks and a new floating obstacle course, which will be anchored in the gulf waters, for visitors.

That means a lot of maintenance checks, creating “cheat sheets,” being an extra hand for the staff and planning to clean up the beach after the season ends.

“I’m planning for the worst,” Hodges said. “For a completely sold out day, every day.”

Contact Bernadette Berdychowski at bberdychowski@tampabay.com.

Follow @bberdychowski

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TAMPA BAY’S 101 TOP WORKPLACES | LARGE COMPANY SPOTLIGHT

The Hoover Met Stadium in Birmingham, Ala., is home of the 2022 Southeastern Conference Baseball Tournament.

Photos courtesy of Sports Facilities Companies

A legacy based on sound strategy The Sports Facilities Companies now has roughly 1,500 employees nationwide, but it had humble beginnings.

BY ELIZABETH DJINIS

Times Correspondent

When people walk into a recreation center to go for a swim or take a yoga class, they’re probably not thinking about how the facility is managed.

But Clearwater-based the Sports Facilities Companies does. In fact, that’s their job — in a way: to create management and operations so seamless and successful that people are drawn to enter the recreation facility whether they know it or not.

“We’ve built this team of sub-

ject-matter experts with the very best systems, processes, programming and vendor partners that allow for all of these individual complexes to plug into our platform,” said CEO and co-founder Jason Clement. “They can get the very best in class so that they can be the highest performing complex, not just financially, but with guest experience, economic impact and mixed use development.”

The Sports Facilities Companies works with sports and recreation centers at almost every step

of the process, whether it’s a strategic vision or helping with management on a facility that has been open for years. When Clement talks about the business plan, he refers to the popular line from “Field of Dreams” with a slight adjustment: It’s not enough to build it and simply assume they’ll come. You need to build it and know they’re coming. That means having in place staffing, training, a brand, pre-sales, risk management and insurance, among other things.

“Once all of those things are

set up, when you hit the ground on opening day, you’re opening up with the sophistication of a three-year operation versus Jason a three-day operClement ation,” Clement said.

The company now stands at roughly 1,500 employees nationwide, but it had humble beginnings. Clement and co-founder Dev Pathik started the organization in 2003 with little more than

themselves. He and Pathik recognized that the sports facilities industry was “fragmented” and “unsophisticated” — in essence, it was ripe for disruption, a quality most start-ups look for before they infiltrate a space.

“Nobody really knew what true north was and what was going well,” Clement said. “The market woke up to the fact that there is a higher level of performance. We can expect more out of these operations.”

Initially, they got off the ground See SPORTS, 23Y

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TAMPA BAY’S 101 TOP WORKPLACES | LARGE COMPANY SPOTLIGHT SPORTS

continued from 22Y through word of mouth and, eventually, speaking engagements.

Over time, the Sports Facilities Companies grew to its now mammoth size, having worked on projects in more than 2,000 communities across the nation. What unites all of them is the mission, Clement said: “to improve the health and economic vitality of the communities” they serve.

“Typically, most of the communities developing these complexes have some iteration of that mission in mind,” Clement said. “The trigger is the recognition to do better within their community than what they’re doing.”

For the employees who have come aboard as the Sports Facilities Companies has charted its exponential growth, it’s been a whirlwind of activity and opportunity. Account executive Lori Moore first worked as a marketing manager at Rocky Top Sports World in Gatlinburg, Tenn., which was “one of the first facilities SFC managed in a sports tourism destination market,” she said.

For Moore, the job was a once-ina-lifetime experience to really combine all of her pasLori sions.

Moore “Never ever did I think I would have the opportunity to combine my love of working with municipal government with that of youth and fitness,” she said. “Getting to combine those three things that I absolutely love into one makes it not so much a job.”

As an account executive overseeing roughly seven facilities, the day-to-day of her job is always a little different. She might need to consult on a management issue, a legal question or a marketing quandary.

In the almost nine years that she’s been with the company, she’s worked her way up from Rocky Top marketing manager to general manager and eventually her current role as account executive.

That trajectory has been a surprise even to her.

Rocky Top Sports World is an indoor and outdoor sports campus in Gatlinburg, Tenn.

“I never expected to have the opportunity to be doing what I’m doing today,” Moore said. “They saw potential and have given me the opportunity. It really is a place where there is opportunity for young individuals who want to move up in this industry.”

Ashley Whittaker, the vice president of marketing and a recently named partner, echoes Moore’s experience. Her move to the company was informed in part by a conAshley versation she Whittaker had with one of their executives at a conference. “I would really like to work with those guys,” she thought after only their second conversation.

It didn’t take long for that to materialize. Roughly six months later, a marketing position opened up. Whittaker asked her husband if he’d be willing to move across the country for the job. As she says, now it’s six years later and they’re still here. Much like

Moore, she had a steady track of promotion from marketing director to vice president of marketing to now, roughly two weeks ago, a partner in the business.

“I wanted to come to an organization where they embraced ideas, where if you had an opportunity and reached out, they would let you run with that,” she said.

But like in any job, there are good days and bad days. The start of COVID-19 was more than a bad day for the team at the Sports Facilities Companies. At that time, they were working with properties in 16 states, all of which had their own eventual reopening procedures. Some states reopened athletic facilities as soon as possible and others waited as long as nine months, Clement said.

“We were busier shutting down venues than we were operating venues,” he said.

But there was a silver lining: When each location did re-open, they generally did so with great success.

“There was a surge of families and society wanting to get back to being active,” Clement said. “We’ve

seen this comeback rebound that’s just exponentially higher in terms of youth and sport participation than what they were going into the pandemic.”

As the market increases, that likely only portends more employee growth. For people like Moore, who estimates that she was the 10th employee overall, that’s a big change from when they started. When Whittaker came on board, there were about 25 people in the corporate office. Now, they’re near 70.

“We expect to keep growing,” Whittaker said. “We’re hoping that people who see this are attracted to what we’re doing and the culture that we’re creating and want to take a look at a career in youth sports.”

But maybe the less important part is where they’re going. What matters is where they came from.

“When you start a company with two people in an apartment in Dunedin, and you now have 1,500 team members, 25 million guests around the country and $500 million in economic impact,” Clement said. “It’s just humbling.”

Photos courtesy of Sports Facilities Companies

SPORTS FACILITIES COMPANIES

Manages recreational and sporting centers across the country.

Employees: 56 in Tampa Bay, 1,048 nationwide Location: Clearwater Website: sportsfacilities.com/

EMPLOYEE COMMENTS

• “I am challenged each day to perform at the highest level.”

• “I feel my ideas are heard and considered. We work as a team, not against each other.”

• “I get to impact the mental, physical, social and spiritual health of communities through my part in the development and management of sports complexes. I get to do this work with people I enjoy, great clients, and we are regularly innovating and working to get better.”

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| Sunday, March 27, 2022

| Tampa Bay Times

TAMPA BAY’S 101 TOP WORKPLACES | LARGE COMPANY SPOTLIGHT

Company adapted quickly to new work model

Data and surveys drove Kforce leaders to pursue an “office occasional” work model.

BY ELIZABETH DJINIS

Times Correspondent

The COVID-19 pandemic had a way of shifting the way we work seemingly overnight.

While the rumored “back-tothe-office” shift slowly appears to be happening, nearly two years later, some businesses have opted to altogether reinvent the way they work.

That’s exactly what Tampa-based staffing services and solutions firm Kforce has done with their move to the “office occasional” model. From the outside, the plan appeared extreme: Kforce announced it would sell its corporate headquarters in Ybor City early last year and leased the fifth floor of an office building in Midtown Tampa. It was a major reduction in office space: from roughly 130,000 square feet to less than 23,000.

But that move really represented the hybrid model of working: With this new office-occasional model, an employee can work the majority of the time outside of the office, free of “chainedto-the-desk” mandates. The office could now be a gathering space for training, meetings or events, not necessarily for daily work.

The decision was set in motion almost as soon as the pandemic hit.

Even that early on, it was clear to president and CEO Joseph Liberatore that something had to change.

“We turned the entire company remote in 24 hours,” Liberatore said. “What we immediately expe-

rienced was that our people were very receptive to figuring things out. Literally 30 days in, we could tell the where and how of work was going to change forever.

The company sent out pulse surveys to take the temperature of their employees — early on, roughly 80 percent said they were “very comfortable” working remotely and didn’t have a desire to return to the office, Liberatore said. Even though those early surveys were informed in part by the safety issues of in-person work with COVID-19, that appetite for remote work continued, driven in large part by employees who now wanted to retain their newfound work-life balance.

The numbers truly drove Kforce leaders to pursue office occasional. Employee productivity is up 30 percent from before the pandemic, according to Liberatore. In 2021, Kforce earned a record high of almost $1.6 billion in revenue.

Those data points solidified to company leaders that remote work not only was possible — it was allowing their employees to thrive.

“I think we definitely earned it,” said Toni Helton, a senior IT recruiter at Kforce. “The numbers show that as a company we produced. This was something we didn’t know we wanted at the time, but we stepped up and we produced.”

Helton said that now, but she was initially a bit hesitant to go remote when the pandemic hit.

Highwoods Properties

KForce is leasing space in Midtown West, an office tower in the Midtown Tampa development.

KForce’s office in Ybor City was about 130,000 square feet. Its new space is less than 23,000.

Kforce

Staffing services firm Employees: 633 Location: Tampa Website: www.kforce.com Employee comments: “Everyone wants you to succeed in this job. No one leaves another hanging. The support has helped me so much in my training. I am so happy to be a part of such an amazing company and team.”

“I do feel as though I am appreciated as an employee. I love the members of my team, and I love the work I do.”

“Kforce has a great culture that is focused on employees being the most important resource for the firm. The handling of the pandemic has proven it.”

As an extrovert used to engaging work environments, she wondered how the shift to an isolated setup — her, a computer and a desk — would go.

But that fear quickly became unfounded — plus, there was no more fighting through the daily Old-

smar-to-Tampa commute or rushing to pick up her child on time.

“I perform better while I’m working and I perform better as a parent,” Helton said. “That quality of life as an employee and as a parent has made a major difference.”

Still, a flexible work schedule does not mean one devoid of routine, according to Crystal Early, senior director of communications and recognition. She makes sure she wakes up early — before her children are awake — to get in some quiet thinking time and a chance to prepare for the day.

Helton’s version includes a home gym she created, including her Peloton and weight lifting equipment. She takes her lunch hour to use her garage gym.

In a 9-to-5 office world, finding moments to back away from the work day would have been almost impossible. In this new model, that no longer is the case.

Liberatore sees this as ushering in a completely new era in our history — there was the agricultural era and the information era. Now, we’re in something completely different.

“Even when people are going to

the office, it’s not going to be that traditional 8-to-5 grind,” Liberatore said. “It’s really giving people flexibility and choice and it’s really empowered through trust and technology.”

From a new-employee standpoint, the hybrid work model is a major draw, Early said. It works for her as well — she’s able to hire people from all over the country.

“It has been a huge selling point for Kforce,” Early said. “A lot of what I’ve heard throughout interviews talking to potential candidates is that they’re very interested in working remotely and the office-occasional work model that we have.”

Still, all of this can be tweaked and changed as Kforce finalizes things on the ground. Their new offices already are more dynamic, Liberatore said, likening the interiors to a “Starbucks feel.” But this is just the beginning.

“We’re going to continue to evolve,” Liberatore said. “This is going to be an ongoing effort to consistently refine and really automate more and more of our processes so that they are technology-friendly.”

Tampa Bay Times

| Sunday, March 27, 2022

TAMPA BAY’S 101 TOP WORKPLACES

A YEAR OF REFLECTION

Shutterstock

Data collected from more than 2 million workers in 2021 showed people were less engaged in their work.

BY BOB HELBIG

Special to the Times

T h e C O V I D -1 9 p a n d e m i c prompted people to give more of themselves to their work in the spring of 2020, but 2021 was the year workers decided to focus more on what they wanted or needed.

That’s evident in employee surveys analyzed by Energage, which gathers feedback from workers nationwide, year-round.

Call 2021 a year of reflection. “People were asking, ‘Is this really what I want to be doing with my life?’” said Lisa Black, director of data science at Energage.

Data collected from more than 2 million workers in 2021 showed people were less engaged in their work compared with a year earlier.

Engagement looks at a combination of factors: motivation, loyalty to the workplace and how likely people are to recommend their workplace to others. Some examples: • Employee engagement dropped to 62.9 percent in 2021 compared with 65.3 percent in 2020.

• Employee engagement bottomed out at 60.3 percent in September-October 2021 before rising to 62.8 percent in December. But that end-ofyear rate was still far lower than

when the pandemic began; engagement peaked at 70.6 percent in April 2020.

• Employees showed a steady decline in loyalty – that is, employees who say they were not looking for work elsewhere – throughout 2021.

By year’s end, it picked up slightly, ending at 66.8 percent. One year earlier, it was at 71.7 percent. Loyalty peaked at 74.4 percent in April 2020.

• For the second half of 2021 vs. the second half of 2020, employee loyalty dropped most of all factors surveyed.

• Referral – employees who say they would recommend their workplace to others – peaked at 88.6 percent in

April 2020 and bottomed out at 81.8 percent in September 2021. As with loyalty, it showed a steady decline throughout 2021 but picked up at the end of the year.

• Employee motivation dropped, too, in 2021. Measuring 86.5 percent in December 2020, it went on a steady slide through September 2021, falling to 83.3 percent, before rising in Q4 2021.

The data show how the last two years have been a roller-coaster ride for people’s relationship with work.

The first half of 2020 reflected uncertainty in the job market when the pandemic hit and some companies started layoffs. It was risky to look elsewhere, and people wanted psychological safety. “People were happy to have a job,” Black said. “The workplace is something predictable.”

In 2021, many employees decided that if their employers were calling them back to the office, they didn’t want to commute anymore, or they didn’t want to give up the flexibility of working from home, Black said. Those who enjoyed flexibility became used to it.

But this doesn’t mean people gave up on their jobs in 2021. It just means they were less positive about their employment situations when compared to the first wave of the pandemic. Employee engagement in 2021 was greater than in 2015 to 2019.

One area that employees were more positive about in 2021 was inclusiveness. Employees felt more included in what was going on (even if they weren’t necessarily happy about it).

People are more mindful, empathetic, and trying harder to make sure voices are heard, Black said.

There’s also a greater focus on diversity, equity and inclusion. “We’ve figured out how to work better together,” she said.

Still, although inclusiveness was up, employees said they felt slightly less clued-in than before. Black’s takeaway: Two-way communication still needs some work. “Just because you are included doesn’t mean you’re informed,” she said.

Bob Helbig is media partnerships director at Energage, a Philadelphiabased employee survey firm. Energage is the survey partner for Top Workplaces.

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| Sunday, March 27, 2022

| Tampa Bay Times

TAMPA BAY’S 101 TOP WORKPLACES

BY BOB HELBIG

Special to the Times

Why do people quit? Money sometimes is a reason, but research

by Energage shows it’s about more than a paycheck. Employees want to feel valued and appreciated. The best employers focus on genuine appreciation, recognition, and connection to keep workers on board.

Here are some common reasons employees leave and what it takes to prevent it: WORKLOAD AND BURNOUT

Overworking an individual or a team can quickly lead to burnout. Prevent employee burnout by promoting work-life balance, encouraging vacation time, and closely monitoring employee schedules and individual workloads.

Money is just one reason workers leave

TOXIC WORKPLACE CULTURE

Beware of a toxic workplace culture filled with interpersonal conflict that doesn’t prioritize its employees. Improve that culture by asking for anonymous feedback; listening to and acting upon employee feedback; practicing genuine employee appreciation; and promoting two-way communication.

POOR PERCEPTION OF LEADERSHIP

Good managers show strong communication, display empathy, and practice accountability. If those characteristics are lacking, employees notice.

LACKLUSTER BENEFITS

Healthcare and vacation time are benefits basics. Others that stand out include tuition reimbursement; flexible work hours; and free or discounted gym memberships. Great benefits separate organizations from the competition.

LACK OF FLEXIBILITY

Workplace flexibility best practices include allowing remote work; openended work hours; and focusing on individual needs. The more employers can acknowledge the needs of every individual, the better off the workforce.

LIMITED DEVELOPMENT AND PROMOTION OPPORTUNITIES

Employees won’t stick around if they can’t maximize their potential. To support advancement, an organization can fill positions with internal candidates and nurture

Shutterstock

skills. Don’t let employees feel they’re running on a treadmill. Provide a path forward.

LACK OF RECOGNITION

If people don’t receive the credit they deserve, they will seek it elsewhere. Creating a culture built on appreciation is one of the least expensive, most powerful ways to limit unwanted turnover. Examples include giving a sincere compliment or a simple “thank you” for a job well done; asking people how they prefer to be appreciated, and following through; and encouraging leaders to demonstrate a culture of appreciation.

LACK OF TRUST AND AUTONOMY

Employees value independence and

trust. They resent feeling micromanaged.

Create a culture of accountability that empowers employees to own and execute their responsibilities.

hours, and budget cuts. All suggest instability. With a lack of information, employees are likely to assume the worst and move on.

LACK OF VALUES AND MISSION

LACK OF A CHALLENGE

A solid foundation of values and a meaningful mission will hold an organization together, especially during turbulent times. A disconnect between what is stated and what’s reflected through action can cause people to leave. When employees are engaged in their work, they’re less likely to look elsewhere.

CONCERNS ABOUT STABILITY

Bob Helbig is media partnerships director at Energage. The employee survey firm is survey partner for Top Workplaces.

Work without meaning is drudgery.

When employees find meaning in their work, they’re more productive, happy, healthy, and engaged. When people clearly understand how their contributions benefit the organization, they’re motivated by more than a paycheck.

Nothing will make employees feel less secure about a job than layoffs, reduced

Tampa Bay Times | Sunday, March 27, 2022

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TAMPA BAY’S 101 TOP WORKPLACES

Visions of the not-too-distant future

Soon, smart glasses, holograms and AI-equipped robots will change our jobs.

BY DANIELLE ABRIL

The Washington Post

The future of how we work will, in a few years, include smart glasses that transport workers into augmented or virtual reality environments, communicating with your co-workers via a hologram from anywhere in the world or relying on robots powered by artificial intelligence to help run manufacturing operations.

That’s the direction technology is headed, says Cristiano Amon, president and CEO of wireless chip firm Qualcomm. Amon, who started at Qualcomm 27 years ago as an engineer, rose through the ranks to take the top job at the San Diego-based company on June 30. Since becoming CEO, he has been working to diversify Qualcomm’s business from focusing primarily on chips for mobile phones to those used in self-driving cars, A.I.-enabled manufacturing machines and more powerful and battery-efficient laptops.

He says Qualcomm’s biggest challenge now is the semiconductor industry not having enough supply to meet demand and hiring talented workers.

“Everything is becoming intelligent,” Amon said in a recent interview with The Washington Post.

“We’ve been focused on providing all of the chips that go into all of those smart devices, whether it is a robot in manufacturing, whether it is a drone for agriculture, whether it’s a point of sale when in retail.”

The majority of Qualcomm’s growth is still being driven by chips for mobile phones. In the first quarter, the company reported net income of $3.4 billion on revenue of $10.71 billion, 56 percent of which came from the mobile chip business. But Amon

highlighted the growth of other chip sets for connected devices, which increased nearly the same percentage as mobile chips.

Given that Qualcomm chips power many of the devices we use, we sat down with Amon to discuss how he sees technology transforming the way we will work in the future. The following interview has been edited for clarity.

You announced last year that Qualcomm would implement a ‘flexible’ workplace. What does that look like now?

We are going to get everyone back to the office in about a couple of weeks, but different geographies may have already started.

Employees wanted to keep the best of work from home, but also at the same time maintain the key elements of our culture like collaboration. People can work from home around three days in a week. Two days in a week, people are going to go into the office and every organization is going to pick one day of those two that everybody’s going to get back together at the same time.

What does the future of work look like over time?

We think the next-generation PC for work from anywhere is going to be different and connected with 5G. We’re making improvements for augmented reality and virtual reality, as we think about a metaverse, to connect people in the office to people who are not in the office.

What is the biggest technological barrier right now to making hybrid work more efficient?

High-performance connectivity is a very big one, especially because what we learned is work from anywhere requires high-quality video. We as a society just finally embraced video telephony as the killer application. We also need high-performance connectivity so you cannot only access information but collaborate with others. Having long battery life so you can actually do that from the cloud will also be important.

What can tech companies like Qualcomm do to make the hybrid work transition easier for workers?

We have the ability to build on what we learned during the pandemic. The importance of video collaboration, for example, why not make that a hologram? More important is how can we build technology that allows people to remain productive wherever they are, not only having access to devices and in the cloud but having the ability to do that at a very high speed.

How will developments in 5G change the way workers in different industries do their jobs in the future?

The role of 5G is very broad. 5G is the easiest way to have all your data in the cloud so everybody can access it remotely and protect all that data. 5G is changing manufacturing as you connect 5G to robots.

They are now driven via the cloud, the data goes to the cloud, and you apply artificial intelligence to improve the data. 5G is changing retail, building indoor navigation systems. At many retail stores you can make an order online and somebody will handpick your product. How they navigate the store and locate everything (through in-store navigation systems requires 5G connectivity).

For office workers, how will 5G change the devices needed for the future of work?

It’s already changing. At Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, we announced together with Lenovo the very first ThinkPad laptop for the future of work. It is 5G-connected, and it is a laptop for the enterprise (workforce) with 28 hours of battery life. So that’s how we see the industry already adapting and building devices that are going to be needed for this workfrom-anywhere environment.

Will the metaverse ever be adopted by the masses and should we expect it to change the way we work?

The number of devices that

ANDREJ SOKOLOW | dpa via ZUMA Press

Cristiano Amon, president and CEO of Qualcomm, speaks at the CES technology trade show Jan. 4 in Las Vegas.

are being built for virtual reality, augmented reality, mixed reality is not a small number by any metric. Tech is not far away from being able to have (smart) glasses.

You’ll be able to walk into a room and capture the image, and it will immediately go to the Internet and say these are the connections you have with people, here’s information from this person’s social network. You can get trained on things that you don’t know. You get step-by-step instructions in your glasses. But more important, the future of how we communicate with each other is going to be via holograms. (Using holograms, remote workers would be able to project a 3D digital image of themselves into a physical meeting, capturing their expressions and body movements.)

What are the metaverse applications to work?

Everybody is going back to the office. It used to be everybody is on Zoom or Teams or you get everybody in a conference room. When you mix the two, the experience is not that great. One key work application we’re seeing right now is how you can connect people that

are not physically in a conference room with people that are, so that everybody has the same experience. The other application is how you think about working from home. When we launched the ThinkPad (from Lenovo), we also announced an accessory that goes along with it. You put on glasses and you’ll see external monitors around your laptop. We’re just at the beginning of that change.

How do you think technology providers will address the issues surrounding the metaverse — cost, bulkiness, uncomfortable physical side effects?

There are a lot of improvements coming. We see latency, or the time delay, becoming smaller and smaller as we get more advanced processors and faster connectivity. That helps prevent people from getting sick or nauseated.

But more important is the significant development in form factors. We’re probably about two or three years away of having form factors that really look like glasses not a head mounted display. That’s going to give the metaverse significant scale.

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| Sunday, March 27, 2022

| Tampa Bay Times