If you’re going to work for a company that is considered to be among the Best Places to Work in all of Michigan’s Great Southwest you’d better be providing some pretty decent perks to your staff, treat them like family and offer top notch service to your clients, customers and staff alike. That’s what it took to gain entry in this sophomore year of the Moody on the Market Best Places to Work for 2020.
Plans to roll out the 20 Best Places earlier were derailed by the coronavirus quarantines, but we decided everybody could use some good news about now, so it’s time to share their good fortune with everyone.
The winning entries that will be revealed live on News Talk 94.9 WSJM-FM tomorrow morning, Monday, April 27th, 2020 on Jim Gifford’s Taking the Lead broadcast with special guest Pat Moody.
The selection committee was chaired by Tiffany Griffin of The Avenue Family Network, who selected Amy Ellspermann of Whirlpool, Natalie Macerata from Lakeshore Public Schools, and Caleb Magley, also from Whirlpool, to score the entries, and they allowed me, Pat Moody, to have a single vote in the process as well. The committee sorted through dozens of pages from the entries to arrive at the final 20 Best, and those will be showcased tomorrow morning, April 27th on the air first, followed by their published stories on Moody on the Market under the tab at the top of the page when those stories “go live” around 7:30am in the morning.
So, who made the cut? The names will be rolled out tomorrow, but we can tell you that they come from a broad array of communities across two counties in the region including winners from St. Joseph, Benton Harbor, Stevensville, Baroda, Berrien Springs, Bridgman, Coloma, and Dowagiac.
The average employee count at the winning companies checks in around 63, but they range in size from half a dozen employees all the way to more than 340 on staff.
There are professional organizations in the ranks of the winners, there are professional and personal services teams, retailers, restaurants, financial services, non-profit organizations, manufacturers, arts based industries and beyond all on the list.
When you read their stories tomorrow, you’ll find a bit of history behind each winning company or organization, the size of their workforce, what they do at their place of work, why the nominator felt each company deserved to be declared among the best, what makes workers there proud to be a part of the team, the 3 best words to describe each company in the ranks of the winners, what “Super Hero”-like “Super Powers” make them top notch, a bit about the leadership of the team in each case and what they do to make it a first class place to work, Hall of Fame-style “wow” moments that set them apart from other companies in the region, how they reward and honor employees on a regular basis, perks and benefits considered to be the top draws for each company, a Yelp! or Trip Advisor type of recommendation for each company, and even a brief, but compelling, recruitment statement encouraging others to join the winning teams.
Our thanks to the Selection Committee for reading through the details of each entry, and to our amazing sponsors who made it all happen including major underwriters Kinexus Group, Wightman, and McGhee’s Heating & Air Conditioning with supporting sponsorships from the Southwest Michigan Regional Chamber of Commerce, United Way of Southwest Michigan and the Mason Jar Cafe without whom this would not have been possible.
Tune in Monday morning for the reveal, and then follow the rest of each story under the Best Places to Work tab at the top of the page.
Each winning company is being invited to a private reception in their honor at a later date when the pandemic quarantines are complete so that we can deliver their trophies to showcase in each business sharing with the rest of the world that they are among the elite in all the region because of what they do with, and for, their dynamic workforce.
