The other day I happened to notice that my wife's October issue of
Working Mother magazine contained a list of the 100 Best Companies to work for. Every time I see one of these lists, I just have to take a look. And the first thing I usually do is to see if my home state of Wisconsin is on the list anywhere (it is, twice). I then began to look at the other companies on the list and what state they are headquartered in, and wondered if I was starting to see a trend in relation to the old
blue state/red state map from the 2004 election.
Please join me below the fold:
Now, being that I'm a husband and father to three daughters, I'm very concerened with women's issues. Whether it's about the right to choose, breast cancer awareness, or equal opportunity, I'm rather sensitive to these and how American society and this administration wants to treat them. I'm afraid that there is a large part of this administration's base that looks upon women as second class citizens, and wouldn't mind turning our society back 100+ years when it comes to the aforementioned issues. With that mindset to back me up, I decided to delve into the numbers.
First of all, here is their methodology for determining the 100 best:
THE APPLICATION
The list of companies selected for the 2006 Working Mother 100 Best Companies was based on an extensive application completed by each company. The application includes detailed questions about the workforce, compensation, child-care and flexibility programs, leave policies and more. The application checks the usage, availability and tracking of programs, as well as the accountability of managers who oversee them. That means it's not enough to have a great program if no one is using it.
WHAT'S MEASURED
Seven areas are measured and scored: workforce profile, compensation, child care, flexibility, time off and leaves, family-friendly programs and company culture.
MAKING THE 100 BEST
After we finalize the list of 100 winners, our writers and editors report on each company, using the application, backup material sent in by the companies and interviews with company representatives. Fact-checkers then verify all the information in the profiles with the companies. The names of companies that apply but do not make the list are kept confidential. All companies, including those that don't make the 100 Best, receive feedback showing how they compared to other applicants.
THIS YEAR'S WINNERS
The company profiles, culled from the applications, reflect 2005 data. With the help of NetX Inc., an independent survey research firm based in Columbus, NJ, we validate the applications for completeness and then tabulate the scores. For this year's 100 Best, we gave particular weight to flex and time off.
The first thing I did was break down the list by state (including Washington DC), which in turn yielded these results:
(State followed by number of companies on the list, blue states in bold)
New York 24
Illinois 9
New Jersey 7
California 6
Michigan 6
Pennsylvania 5
Virginia 5
Massachusetts 4
Connecticut 4
3 States 3
6 States 2
9 States 1
There are 27 states in the list, of which 15 are blue. Although the list contains almost as many red states, blue states host an overwhelming majority of the companies, 78 out of the 100.
One of the questions that came to mind was, do companies that base themselves in blue/progressive states lean towards a more "progressive" workforce environment?
I then wondered if it's possible to be progressive in this way, and still be profitable. For that, I turned to the Fortune 500 list of largest companies based on revenues. I broke this list down by state as well, with the following results:
(State followed by number of companies on the list, blue states in bold)
New York 20
California 10
Illinios 10
Texas 8
Connecticut 5
New Jersey 5
Ohio 5
Michigan 4
Minnesota 4
Washington 4
4 States 3
3 States 2
7 States 1
There are 24 different states on this list, with 14 of them being blue and hosting 71 of the companies. So it would appear that one could be quite profitable and still be headquartered in a blue state.
I then proceeded to cross check this list with the one from Working Mother, and compiled some more interesting stats:
1. A total of 25 companies appear on both lists, hosted by 11 different states.
2. Of these, 9 are blue states with 22 companies in them.
3. 8 of the 9 companies that appear in Fortune's top 25 are blue state based.
4. And finally, 21 states do not appear on either list.
I know the whole blue state/red state thing is probably passé, but depending on whether this diary generates any kind of interest, I would like to do a follow up with some further analysis on this data and anything that might come up in any ensuing comments.
Thank you.