Meet the 2025 Top Employers: See what excellence looks like in 2025
Meet the 2025 Top Employers: See what excellence looks like in 2025
The world of work is ever-changing, but one constant remains, exceptional organisations lead with their people. We are thrilled to unveil the 2025 Top Employers and introduce you to the organisations setting the standard for excellent HR practices in 2025.
We are proud to announce that over 2,400 Top Employers have been Certified in 2025 across 125 countries and regions with over 13 million lives impacted. This recognition underscores these organisations’ commitment to fostering outstanding HR strategies and people practices globally.
As the global authority in recognising excellence in people practices, Top Employers Programme certifies organisations based on the results of their HR Best Practices Survey. This survey covers six HR domains and 20 topics, including People Strategy, Work Environment, Talent Acquisition, Learning, Diversity and Inclusion, Wellbeing, and more.
The journey to become a Top Employer is no small feat. It requires a steadfast commitment to continuous improvement and a holistic approach to HR practices. The Certification Programme requires organisations to undergo a rigorous process that ensures that the most exceptional organisations’ commitment to excellence is reflected in their achievement of attaining their Top Employers Certification.
As we celebrate our 2025 Top Employers, David Plink our CEO has some words that expand on what this year’s Certified organisations embody: “Consistency in a not-so-consistent world? In a time of constant change—where technological, economic, and social shifts are ever-present—exceptional times bring out the best in people and organisations. This year’s Top Employers have showcased this strength, by demonstrating outstanding dedication to their employees. We are proud to celebrate these companies and their achievements in 2025.”
There are several approaches and recognition options available to potential Top Employers to ensure there’s a path to Certification for organisations of different structures, sizes, and geographic footprints. Those different paths are distinguished by different globally recognised Certification Seals that Top Employers can receive. The different Certification Seals include the Country/region Seal, Regional Seal, Global Seal and Enterprise Seal.
Global Top Employers are organisations that participate in a minimum number of countries (20 to 25 depending on several regional certifications) and regions (certified in three or four regions) including the global headquarters. Becoming a Global Top Employer signifies an organisation’s commitment to globally aligned excellent people practices.
These are the organisations that are globally Certified as leaders in HR for their outstanding HR strategies and people practices:
This is your chance to meet the organisations setting the new benchmark for 2025.
Discover the Top Employers Certification Programme and explore how we can enable your organisation with our data-led insights to stand out as an employer of choice.
Ready to start your Top Employers journey?Learn more about the benefits of becoming a Top Employer. Contact us now.
DEI 分析和使用的衡量标准将变得更加复杂。并不是所有的人口统计数据都能直接获取。然而，我们从性别代表性方面的进展中了解到，数据对于改进工作至关重要。
大多数人 “将在其职业生涯的某个阶段被积极纳入 DEI 战略，不同的经历将日益得到认可。我们很可能会采取更加全面的包容战略，以补充目前针对代表性不足群体的有针对性的举措。
立即填写表格，下载杰出雇主调研机构《2024全球职场趋势报告》.
Best Practice | Accenture Accentuates the Employee Experience
The programme “Change @ Work, Poland edition” started in 2019 as the first One Accenture initiative to promote a sense of belonging within the organisation. The programme aims to improve employee satisfaction by helping them feel more valued and connected to the organisation.
Using a dedicated AI tool, Accenture Poland engaged approximately 250 employees in real time to shape their culture of belonging. Based on extensive research, they have determined four main areas that most influence employees’ sense of belonging. Under this programme, Accenture Poland is running 15 amazing projects to shape a better world for more than 9 000 employees.
This is just a snapshot of Accenture’s innovative best practice. You can find the entire practice in our HR Best Practices database, which is exclusively available to Top Employers. Get inspiration and insight into the approach, challenges and learnings experienced by certified Top Employers. Access it now via the Top Employers Programme if you are certified or learn more about it here!
Why the practice was needed
During difficult and unpredictable times, Accenture Poland believes that leaders must act alongside younger colleagues to co-create the best solutions. Involving employees at all levels of an organisation can also help them feel engaged with the organisation in a meaningful way and could, therefore, help retain talent.
How the practice was implemented
Accenture’s Change @ Work, Poland edition consisted of three main steps:
Accenture Poland conducted research using individual in-depth interviews with approximately 50 employees to understand the main factors that determine a feeling of belonging within Accenture.
The analysed dataset included:
The anonymised personal data of respondents was obtained from internal human resource management systems.
Qualitative data – statements of respondents obtained based on the interview discussion guide.
Quantitative data – responses to questions asked using a five-point Likert scale.
Based on the research, the organisation designed four main activities that were most important for employees in terms of belonging.
Using an AI tool, Remesh, Accenture Poland involved approximately 250 employees in shaping final solutions that best met employees’ expectations.
The co-creation method was used, and the initiative was run by employees for employees as a way to understand and focus on their real needs.
Results of the practice
More than 300 employees gave feedback to shape the final solutions.
15 initiatives are being implemented to increase employee satisfaction.
Accenture Poland is moving from talent consumption toward talent creation, with Gen Z pushing for this change.
Meet the New Top Employers
Earlier this year, Top Employers Institute proudly announced that over 2 300 Top Employers had received the Top Employers Certification in 2024. Those Top Employers were recognised across 121 countries and regions.
In June, we are excited to share that 58 new Regional Top Employers and one European Top Employer joined our global community of organisations committed to excellence in people practices. This recognition underscores these organisations’ commitment to fostering outstanding HR strategies and people practices globally.
As the global authority in recognising excellence in people practices, the Top Employers Institute Certification Programme is an extensive process involving an independently audited and fact-based HR Best Practices Survey and validation to ensure truthful answers. The survey covers six domains and 20 subtopics:
In 2023 and 2024, organisations and leaders had much to consider, with many things in flux. David Plink, CEO of Top Employers Institute, observed: “In a world where geopolitical, societal, and macro-economic developments follow each other in rapid succession, the Top Employers 2024 are showing once again that they are a beacon of stability and reliability. Top Employers have shown that despite turbulent times, their focus remains on creating the best workplace possible for their people to thrive.”
When asked what makes a Top Employer, David Plink shared: “In my 16 years with the company, there are two characteristics that I have observed consistently within the members of the Top Employers community. First, certified Top Employers go above and beyond for their people. They are the embodiment of people focus. Secondly, not a single Top Employer got certified without always striving for more. To learn, to become better and to stay curious at all times. People-focused and a growth mindset. It sounds so simple in summary, but it takes a lot to consistently live up to these principles.”
See the full list of the newly Certified Top Employers, below:
How to Build a Strong Company Culture in a Global Organisation with NTT Data
Every organisation has a culture, whether it was intentionally or passively created. A healthy workplace culture is one of the fundamental elements of a successful company. In today’s global landscape, businesses extend their operations across borders and cultivate diverse workforces. Developing and maintaining a strong culture in this context presents some unique challenges. A positive work environment benefits a company in numerous ways, which is why it is essential to build that culture rather than leave it to chance.
During our insightful conversation filled with personal anecdotes at the 2023 Top Employers Inspire event, Kim Curley, VP of People & Organisation at NTT DATA, shared valuable perspectives and actionable strategies on the art of crafting and nurturing a strong corporate culture. Kim’s role is unique in that she’s responsible for NTT DATA’s internal change management process and for the organisation’s consultancy services in that space, which she called “the personal side of business where all the wonderful messy, human things happen.” Experiencing change from the inside and managing it as a third party for other organisations has given her great insight into how to successfully build a strong culture.
Crafting a Culture
Like many companies, NTT DATA re-evaluated its priorities and values during the massive societal and workplace changes brought on by the pandemic. Kim explained, “We had been through a tremendous amount of change in the past three years and we wanted to assess what aspects of our culture had weakened that we needed to strengthen.” Trust, community, and success were the three values identified through their discussions.
The next step was deciding how to strengthen those values in their workplace culture. Kim shared that the discussion began with a guiding question: “How do we define these values that make us special and make us a place where people want to come work and a place that clients want to hire?” Three strategies emerged as important aspects of crafting their culture.
Involve employees in developing initiatives around the three core values. If culture is not built from the ground up, it will be very difficult to enforce it from the top down.
Create a social accountability contract. Foster a sense of responsibility among employees to embody and uphold the core values.
Anchor to a career coach model. Resources extend beyond hierarchical, mentor-like relationships to help employees develop across the different roles they hold as consultants and over the arc of their careers.
Changing people’s mindsets is one of organisations’ most significant challenges when implementing new initiatives. “It takes a tremendous amount of energy not only from the people trying to encourage the change but also from the brave souls trying to make the change. That’s always the hardest part, to be a supporter and to step into that new space,” said Kim. This process was an excellent opportunity to lean on the social accountability contract and encourage employees to support one another as they adapted.
Silos
Silos are another familiar challenge companies face, and this challenge becomes even more pronounced when a company operates on a global scale. One of the significant problems posed by silos is their potential to impede the growth of a company-wide culture. To confront this issue head-on, Kim’s team developed a proactive strategy. She described their process, “We look at what our company values mean for each team. What can be done to make these values come to life in our individual geographies, business units, and ways of working?” For example, the community looks very different for a team co-located in the same geographic area with an office space than for a remote team working from different countries. Community is equally essential in both scenarios, though initiatives to cultivate a sense of community will look very different.
Organisational Hurdles
Aligning policies and procedures with company culture is essential to NTT DATA’s success. “When you’re trying to change culture, one of the things that will trip you up the fastest is if the organisational elements of your business do not support the cultural change,” Kim said to elaborate on this point. Changes to a company’s infrastructure have far-reaching effects and can either support or hinder how the culture evolves. Therefore, it is critical to be intentional about company policies and structure them in a way that supports the culture.
Kim compared their approach to caring for a garden to summarise how her team fosters a strong company culture. “You have to constantly nurture it to help it grow and be very aware of what you add to it,” she explained. Ultimately, a positive company culture is a constant work in progress. Although building it requires time and effort, the long-lasting benefits are immense. Low turnover rates, boosted productivity, and high morale are all results that help a company achieve success.
One of the things I enjoyed most about our discussion was hearing about Kim’s personal experience with NTT DATA’s cultural changes and how those changes impacted her daily workflow and her relationships with colleagues. I encourage readers to check out our full conversation for even more insights and a personal perspective on what a strong culture can mean to employees.
Haier Europe: Elevating its People Practices with the Top Employers Programme
About Haier Europe
Haier Europe is a global leader in home appliances and consumer electronics, recognised for 15 consecutive years as the world’s No.1 brand globally in major appliances, selling under the Candy, Hoover and Haier brands. The organisation comprises of 750 colleagues in the UK&I and 100,000 globally.
Haier Europe’s Top Employers Journey
Haier Europe had been on an improvement journey, investing heavily in people systems, processes and benefits and whilst colleagues inside the business would have seen the transformation, they wanted to receive external recognition in order to attract great talent, and give candidates the confidence to know that they had been certified by an external, independent validation process. They therefore joined the Top Employers Certification Programme, and following completion of the HR Best Practices Survey and Validation Process, were certified as a UK Top Employer 2023.
Elevating its People Practices
“We have definitely seen the profile of our employer brand increase, we see our candidate numbers are very strong and our retention figures are improving in key areas, but the most important outcome from joining the Top Employers Programme is that it has really made Haier Europe a better workplace for our colleagues because it has given us the impetus and direction to keep improving.” Matthew Given, Group HR Director UK & Ireland, Haier Europe
Having achieved Top Employer Certification in year one, the Haier Europe team immediately started work on its action plan to further improve its HR, using the Top Employers Results Dashboard. They did this by:
Having a dedicated team of specialists within the HR team working on the Top Employers Certification project.
Aligning the Top Employers HR Best Practices Survey topics and results with the action plans and choosing focus areas which would add most value to the business.
Regularly reviewing with the team each quarter to ensure that improvements were being made within these focus areas.
Impressive results
In year two, following on from the action planning, Haier Europe increased their score on the Top Employers Best Practices Survey by 20% points.
They had prioritised Employee Listening, wellbeing and DEI, with the new colleague listening strategy bringing great insights and making sure that they really understood how colleagues felt about the business and its programmes. They also mapped, explored and improved many more colleague and candidate journeys.
The leadership team has also taken notice of the tremendous progress and are now championing many new initiatives across engagement, wellbeing and DEI.
Best Practice | Virtusa’s Talent Digital Transformation
Certified Top Employer, Virtusa, committed to an 18-month-long HR digital transformation to dramatically change the digital experience for their employees, covering everything from recruiting and onboarding to learning and development, inclusion, and rewards. The organisation did not simply make small incremental changes; they reimagined all their processes and radically transformed them into a single, fully integrated, hyper-personalised employee platform.
This is just a snapshot of Virtusa’s innovative best practice. You can find the entire practice in our HR Best Practices database, which is exclusively available to Top Employers. Get inspiration and insight into the approach, challenges and learnings experienced by certified Top Employers. Access it now via the Top Employers Programme if you are certified or learn more about it here!
Why the practice was needed:
Although technology is at the core of their business, Virtusa struggled to make technology work correctly for their employees. They had too many disjointed systems that were not creating a seamless employee experience. The systems were not driving engagement or speaking to one another. Eranga Pathirage, VP & Head of HR for the UK, Europe, and the Middle East + the Global Head of HR Tech Transformation, helped the organisation dramatically improve its talent understanding and engagement through a digital HR transformation.
Pathirage recalls that they already had all this valuable data about their 35 000 employees across 25 countries. As a provider of technical services, they respected and knew the power of technology. They saw a solution in centring the relationship between technology and their employees to drive adoption and employee loyalty.
Pathirage recalls that the most challenging part of their HR digital transformation was the beginning, as he and his team wanted to be bold and did not know exactly how to start; they wanted to involve everyone in the business and obtain their buy-ins as well. Pathirage and his team took on the enormous task of reviewing all their processes to truly reimagine a digital solution offering their people an optimal employee experience. As he explained, they were not making incremental changes to some of their HR systems but instead re-hauling the entire process. In thinking through the right solution then, they followed some important grounding principles:
There would be one single source of truth.
Their HR digital solution would be fully integrated within Virtusa’s IT system.
The technology they picked would also give the company the ability to evolve. The technology selected and implemented should allow Virtusa to stay agile and guide the business accordingly.
As a technology services organisation, Virtusa also wanted to put technology first.
With these grounding principles, the organisation set out to pick a Software as a Service (SaaS) solution for each element of the employee experience. The solution as a whole was born in the cloud.
The results of this HR digital transformation can already be seen. The company now has an AI chatbot to assist in a personalised candidate experience, providing a consistent company story for prospective employees. SkillPrism, powered by AI, can create an employee profile from multiple data points to fully understand competencies within the business. The company can now also offer a personalised learning journey for their employees and, through Edge, can offer their own internal “LinkedIn,” giving each employee one to three personalised job openings across customers, domains, and countries.
Once this digital solution was offered, Virtusa employees adopted it quickly, with an 85% adoption rate in the first two weeks.
Learn more about the Top Employers Certification here.
Navigating a Dynamic Workforce
Top Employers Institute’s Navigating a Dynamic Workforce analyses the latest trends in the changing nature of the workforce and how employers can navigate and adapt to a dynamic workforce while maintaining employee engagement and success.
In the report, our analysis offers organisations a look at how they can unlock business success by leveraging and empowering their contracted, non-traditional talent with four recommendations. Those recommendations are:
Include contingent workers: Successful organisations value and respect every contributor, including contingent workers. They should be included in opportunities that normal employees would experience, such as access to various HR processes, practices, and deliverables.
Support employees with directing their own career evolution: Organisations should empower employees to chart their career paths and provide resources for self-directed learning. This can be done through online self-service resources, interactive career portals, internal digital career marketplaces, and mentoring/coaching for career development.
Provide resources that promote self-directed learning to all employees: The speed at which skills and skill demands are evolving requires ongoing reskilling. Organisations should offer online training programs, personalised learning portals, and micro-learning content integrated into everyday activities and facilitate opportunities for employees to learn from one another through online learning communities.
Facilitate a smooth transition into and out of the organisation for all employees: With a dynamic workforce, onboarding and offboarding become important ways to leave a lasting impression on employees. Organisations should optimise the onboarding experience and implement meaningful offboarding practices, including a fit-for-purpose offboarding experience and gathering feedback from departing employees.
You can read more about each recommendation and gain a better understanding of the trends affecting the world of work by completing the form on the left and downloading the analysis for free.
The Journey to Become a Top Employer
Tell us about yourself and your role at Top Employers Institute
Greetings, I’m Sebastiaan ter Horst, stationed at the headquarters in Amsterdam, where I have been the face of the Certification team since 2021 for Top Employers Institute. Leading a dedicated team spread across the globe. I take pride in steering the Certification process and ensuring optimal service delivery for our Participants.
As the Certification Director, my primary commitment lies in upholding the quality of our Certification program. Collaborating with diverse teams worldwide, I continuously strive to enhance our services and support our teams and individual members in their journey towards success. It’s not just about maintaining standards but also about empowering every team and team member to achieve excellence.
Can you give us an overview of the Certification Process?
The Certification Process consists of four stages: Service kick-off, Survey, Validation and Certification. It is designed to help the Participant benefit from our programme.
The first stage is the Service kick-off, as the words suggest, the start of the programme. The purpose is to set the right conditions for our participants to complete the Survey and be prepared for the validation process. Participants are provided with an overview of the upcoming Certification Process and what is required, receive a high-level look at the HR Best Practices Survey and any updates, plus be introduced and updated to the Top Employers Portal and supporting tools and materials.
The following stage is the Survey. Here, the Participants will answer the HR Best Practices Survey questions. Participants who are new to the program have the opportunity to answer all questions. Participants who have completed a Survey in the previous year have the chance to update their answers from last year and answer all the new HR Best Practices questions. When ready, the Participant submits the HR Best Practices Survey answers for Validation.
The Validation stage is the third stage in the process. The Validation stage aims to ensure the answers submitted in the survey reflect the HR practices and conditions provided to the employees within the company. By checking the consistency of interpretation and proactively correcting potential errors or ambiguities, Top Employers Institute ensures that all submitted data provided for certification is correct and reliable.
The Participant is contacted to schedule a Validation session. An overview of questions within the survey to be discussed will be provided before the session so you can prepare for your session with the HR Auditor. Additional clarification and/or evidence to illustrate that a practice has been implemented according to our definitions and requirements may be requested before or based on the Validation outcome. Typical examples of such requests for further evidence are employee handbooks, technology screenshots, policy documents, etc.
The Certification stage is the fourth and final stage after the Validation stage is completed. Certified Participants are invited to attend a Certification Activation session where Top Employers Institute will take them through all the communication tools available to leverage your employer branding activities as a certified Top Employer. In this session, Top Employers will also be taken through the structure and navigation within the Results Dashboard, including Benchmark data from other Participants of the Certification Program.
What makes the Top Employers Certification Methodology unique?
The Certification Methodology applied is unique in many ways.
The Certification methodology is a holistic and fact-based validation approach to the people practices available for the employees of Certified Top Employers and is not based on opinions or perceptions. It is a single methodology applicable to all participants in the program, ensuring that all Top Employers are held to the same standard, thus providing a global benchmark.
The quality of the validation process is ensured by a team of highly qualified auditors who went through a rigorous qualification process and are subject to ongoing learning and calibration. In addition, our quality process, including system, quality checks and monitoring, ensures that the highest level of quality for our Certification Program is ensured.
Lastly, our Certification program, including our processes and Certification Results, is subject to an annual external audit.
How often are the HR Best Practices Survey questions updated, and what drives those updates?
The HR Best Practice survey is updated yearly to ensure it syncs with the ever-evolving HR landscape. On average, 10 percent of the questions will be updated every year. A survey update is informed by (external) research into HR trends and developments as well as reviewing client data (trends in practice adoption) and input and feedback received by our clients during the various stages of the certification process (survey, Validation, results, ad-hoc feedback). Changes to the survey can be incremental, e.g. small tweaks to the description of a practice, or more significant (e.g. adding a completely new practice or even a topic). We always aim to find a good balance between stability and staying up to date.
How does Top Employers Institute decide how to weigh the importance of the different questions in the survey?
The centre of gravity in our HR Best Practices survey is the employee experience.
60% of the overall scoring points are in the domains Attract, Develop and Engage, as these domains represent the end-to-end employee journey. In addition, you will see that individual practices that directly impact the employee experience have a higher weight than practices that are supporting or conditional.
About 20% of the survey consists of benchmark questions, which are included for contextual purposes and benchmarking and are not scored. The weighing of the different questions in the survey aims to be effective in setting a meaningful threshold for certification.
Several standard and fundamental practices have a relatively high weight. These practices are seen as essential for any Top Employer. In contrast, ‘advanced practices’, which refer to practices commonly seen in organisations with slightly more mature HR practices, could have varying relevance depending on the organisation’s size, industry, or region. Although these practices might be inspirational to most, their weight and impact on scoring are relatively limited.
As the year-over-year adoption of practices is changing, the weight of individual practices is reviewed on a yearly basis, too. When needed, the weights are adjusted to reflect changed importance. Commonly, a new practice, when just added to the survey, will be given a low weight (or even introduced as a benchmark question), and when we see the adoption levels of these practices rising, we increase the weight.
How does your team validate the answers given by organisations in the survey?
First of all, with a lot of passion and motivation! For the validation moment itself, established criteria and standards apply to each practice and assess the level of maturity of a participant’s processes and procedures against these requirements, including looking at the supporting documentation. After initial review through the Top Employers Institute portal, the HR Auditor has a validation session with the Participant to discuss a selection of practices in more detail and clarification.
What upcoming topics and questions are Top Employers Institute looking at for future surveys?
Allow me to mention the latest World of Work Trends report based on the responses from our Participants in the 2024 program. The trends mentioned in the World of Work Trends report illustrate the expected future changes in our HR Best Practices Survey. I want to mention some other perspectives as well:
Human Centricity (already captured in the WoW trends report, but also as a more general theme)
Continuous focus on (Digital) Employee Experience, including leveraging AI in a human/responsible way,
Employability
GenZ
Contingent / Flexible Workforce
What one piece of advice would you give an organisation taking part in the Top Employers Certification Programme for the first time?
Reach out to us when you have a question or if something needs to be clarified. Our team is committed to enabling our participants to have a successful Certification experience and will support them when appropriate. They will provide tips and guidance for efficient completion of the Survey that is appropriate to the needs of each Participant. For instance, how to organise the internal team to answer the HR Best Practices Survey in a timely manner, clarify Survey questions and what sort of supporting evidence is needed, how to use the tools provided in the Portal, etc.
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