Ad Age
Best Places to Work 2024

The 50 winners include a strong showing of ad agencies (13), ad tech firms (12), digital agencies (eight) and marketing agencies (six).

The winners tally also includes three health care agencies, three media agencies, two branding and brand consulting firms, and one firm each in the fields of business transformation, event/experiential marketing and public relations.

Among the 50 winners, nearly half—24—have headquarters in the New York or Los Angeles metro areas.

The New York metro area is home to 17 winners—14 in Manhattan, one in Brooklyn and two in Fairfield County, Connecticut. The Los Angeles area has seven winners.

Toronto is home to three Ad Age Best Places winners. Chicago, Dallas-Fort Worth, Minneapolis, San Diego and Boulder, Colorado, each scored two winners.

The employee engagement and satisfaction survey included a set of statements that employees responded to (from “strongly disagree” to “strongly agree”) along with some open-ended and demographic questions. This made up 75% of the overall score.

The winners outperformed on specific offerings including employee satisfaction with tuition reimbursement benefits, retirement plan benefits and health care coverage.

Those three benefits—tuition, retirement, health care—were significant differentiators in the employee survey, scoring the biggest difference in positive responses between staffers who worked at winning companies and staffers who worked at companies that didn’t make the ranking.

Among winners, 94% offered a 401(k) retirement plan, 30% had an employee stock ownership plan and 22% had a profit-sharing plan.

Beyond positive perceptions about pay and benefits, employees at winning workplaces gave their companies high marks on key points including:

• “This organization provided as much initial training as I needed.”
• “This organization provides as much ongoing training as I need.”
• “Deadlines at this organization are realistic.”
• “Staffing levels are adequate to provide quality products/services.”
• “This organization helps me pursue a career path that aligns with my skills and interests.”
• “This organization encourages me to develop professionally and/or acquire new skills.”
• “Most days, I look forward to going to work.”
• “At this organization, employees have fun at work.”
• “This organization effectively communicates its progress towards meeting departmental goals.”
• “I have a good understanding of how this organization is doing financially.”
• “My job provides me with a sense of meaning and purpose.”
• “I am able to maintain a reasonable balance between work and my personal life.”

The employee survey covered pay and benefits and seven other core focus areas. The best companies did better than the rest in all of these areas.

The area of pay and benefits proved to be the biggest differentiator based on employee responses, with a 6.5-point advantage in the percentage of positive responses for winners versus companies in the competition that didn’t make the ranking.

The best places outscored other workplaces by about 5 percentage points in training, development and resources. The winners bested other workplaces by about 4 percentage points in four areas: corporate culture and communications, leadership, overall engagement and role satisfaction.

The two remaining areas—work environment and relationship with supervisor—were smaller differentiators for the best companies versus others.

The employer questionnaire covered a company’s policies, practices, benefits and demographics. This made up 25% of the overall score.

The winning companies outscored other entrants in such areas as:

Pay and benefits:

• Tuition reimbursement.
• Allowing employees additional paid time off for community service activities or volunteer work.
• Paid sabbaticals.

Diversity:

• Diversity and inclusion programs (84% of the winners have a diversity and inclusion task force or committee).
• Ongoing diversity training.

Recruitment, training and development:

• Formalized programs/practices for succession planning.
• Recruitment and retention programs for older workers, veterans, employees who may require accommodations for mental or physical limitations and employees of varying ethnic and cultural backgrounds.

Work-life balance:

• Option to work flexible hours or a compressed work week.
• Financial education workshops, seminars or classes.
• Meetings and staff-only events are limited to work hours only.
• On-site personal development and/or stress management workshops, seminars or classes.

Virtually all of the winning companies offer telecommuting options for employees. A handful of the winners have embraced a 100% remote workplace while finding ways for employees to connect.

For example, San Diego-based NP Digital operates on a 100% remote basis in the U.S. The digital agency has in-office options in some locations for employees who prefer them, and it provides for local meet-ups in states where it has large groups of staffers to encourage team connection.

MNTN calls Austin, Texas, its headquarters, but the ad tech company embraces a fully remote workforce. New York-based Goodway Group also is a fully remote organization; the digital agency holds two all-company summits a year so staffers can connect, learn, work and be social.

On average, about 80% of employees at Ad Age Best Places winners were telecommuting in 2023, down from 100% after the COVID-19 pandemic began in March 2020 but far above these companies’ pre-pandemic telecommuting level of 13%.

The 50 winners earned their spots in Ad Age Best Places to Work 2024 based on their strong scores in the employee survey and employer questionnaire. Among all the winners, here are a few ideas that stood out:

Transparency: Promoting clear communication on what’s up, and down, with the business is a common theme among the winning companies.

“Want to be a great place to work?” Signal Theory, a Kansas City, Missouri, ad agency, said in its award entry. “Stop being mysterious. Tell people how decisions get made, how things work and how those things relate to the values you tout. … Transparency trumps all the ping-pong tables, massage chairs, parties and ‘creative’ perks in the whole wide world of advertising.”

Sharethrough, a Montreal-based ad tech firm, said transparency “creates trust and a sense of shared purpose among our team.”

“We understand the importance of open communication, especially in times of change and adversity,” Sharethrough said in its entry. “We make every effort to be transparent with our employees, keeping them informed about our business’s challenges, successes and strategies.”

High Wide & Handsome, a Los Angeles ad agency, touts its “extreme financial transparency.”

“Every quarter we open our books to the entire staff, sharing everything from our profit and forecast to our bank balances, accounts receivable, accounts payable, 12-month rolling trends, comparisons to previous quarters and more,” High Wide & Handsome said. “As a result, our employees never go to sleep wondering about the solvency of the agency or the security of their jobs.”

Paid sabbaticals: Almost one-third of the winning companies offer paid sabbaticals.

Basis Technologies, a Chicago-based ad tech firm and the No. 1 Best Place to Work among companies with more than 200 employees, offers a three-week fully paid sabbatical after every four years of service.

Signal Theory gives employees a four-week paid sabbatical at their eight-year anniversary mark and every five years after that. Spectrum Science, a Washington-based health care agency, and Goodway offer employees a four-week sabbatical every seven years.

Perks that work: The best workplaces deliver on the basics of good compensation and benefits such as health care insurance, but many of the winners go above and beyond.

Among the 50 companies, 15 pay 100% of health care premiums for employees; some also pay 100% of premiums for dependents. Noble Studios, a digital agency in Reno, Nevada, said: “We proudly pay for 100% of medical insurance premiums so employees and families can access care without financial barriers.”

Beyond solid benefits, many winners offer standout special perks. MNTN gives employees a $2,000 annual vacation allowance. That jumps to $5,000 once a team member reaches the five-year mark, and the allowance then grows each year with no cap.

There is such a thing as a free lunch. Once employees reach their 10-year anniversary, High Wide & Handsome provides a “Lunch for Life” credit card with no daily spending limit—free lunch, five days a week, 52 weeks a year, for as long as staffers stay at the agency.