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Competition Among Employers Intensifies: 2008 List of Canada’s Top 100 Employers is Released

Toronto, ON (PRWEB) October 10, 2007

The new 2008 list of Canada’s Top 100 Employers has been released in the midst of the tightest labour market in a generation and record competition among employers for a place on the list. Now in its 8th year, the annual competition recognizes employers that are industry leaders at attracting and retaining employees. The competition is organized by Mediacorp Canada Inc., Canada’s largest publisher of employment guides and job-hunting periodicals.

“We’ve written about the approaching labour shortages for several years,” says Richard Yerema, who heads the editorial team on the Canada’s Top 100 Employers project. “Well, the shortages are now here and employers are competing for talent like never before.”

To develop this year’s Top 100 list, Mediacorp examined the recruitment histories of over 72,000 employers across Canada that it tracks for various job-hunting periodicals, including its online search engine for new jobs in Canada, Eluta.ca. Much of Mediacorp’s work consists of monitoring recruitment at thousands of Canadian employers, indexing new job announcements to determine which employers are the most active in their field and region.

From this initial group, Mediacorp invited 10,000 of the fastest-growing employers, plus 4,000 other companies and organizations in industries that Mediacorp editors wanted to examine more closely, to apply for this year’s competition. Employers were asked to complete an extensive application process that included a detailed review of their operations and HR practices. Author Richard Yerema and his editorial team looked for the most interesting and novel things employers were doing, so they could report on “best practices” in each field. Over 1,800 employers started the application process to be considered for the 2008 edition of Canada’s Top 100 Employers.

In reviewing each employer’s application, Yerema and his team reviewed eight key areas: (1) Physical Workplace; (2) Work Atmosphere & Social; (3) Health, Financial & Family Benefits; (4) Vacation & Time Off; (5) Employee Communications; (6) Performance Management; (7) Training & Skills Development; and (8) Community Involvement. The editors’ internal grades for each of these areas – and the reasons why each employer was selected – are published annually in Canada’s Top 100 Employers and summarized online at Eluta.ca. These criteria have remained consistent throughout all eight editions of the Canada’s Top 100 Employers project.

In choosing the finalists for this year’s Canada’s Top 100 Employers competition, Mediacorp editors considered how each employer compared to others in its industry. This year’s list includes large and small employers from a range of industries, offering varying benefits and working conditions. The common thread that runs through the finalists is that each is an industry leader. From accounting firms to police forces, the employers chosen this year are leaders in their industry in attracting and retaining quality employees. This year, Mediacorp editors also considered three emerging areas of interest: diversity and inclusiveness programs; initiatives to assist new Canadians and recent immigrants; and projects that integrate environmental awareness into an organization’s culture. The editors’ choices for Canada’s top employers in these three areas will be released in spring 2008.

“We are now seeing best-of-class recruitment and retention practices spreading beyond the industries where they started much faster than before,” says Anthony Meehan, president of Mediacorp Canada Inc., which organizes the annual Canada’s Top 100 Employers competition. “Employers in one industry are now cherry-picking innovative benefits seen in other industries much more quickly because they are increasingly competing outside their industry for talented employees.”

About Mediacorp:

Mediacorp Canada Inc. is Canada’s largest publisher of quality employment periodicals. The company specializes in publishing directories and guides that let job-hunters find great employers and interesting new job opportunities in their field. Since 1992, more than one million of Mediacorp’s job-hunting guides have been sold. Mediacorp’s latest project is the popular job search engine Eluta.ca, which allows job-seekers to find new job announcements – and verified information on perks and benefits – directly from thousands of employers across Canada. Each spring, Mediacorp also organizes a policy-oriented conference on the Canada’s Top 100 Employers project called the Top Employer Summit, which is Canada’s largest annual gathering of senior-level human resources professionals. Mediacorp co-presents the conference each year with Towers Perrin, which also manages a sophisticated employee survey tool used by applicants to the annual Canada’s Top 100 Employers competition.

To view the complete list of winners chosen for 2008 Canada’s Top 100 Employers competition, please visit: http://www.canadastop100.com/national

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