Dot Foods is proud to announce that we have officially been certified as a Great Place To Work®. This year, we partnered with Great Place To Work®—the global authority in workplace culture and most respected workplace recognition program—for our annual employee survey. Great Place To Work® “makes it easy to survey your employees, uncover actionable insights, and get recognized for your great company culture.” Great Place To Work’s® Trust Index Survey© is used by thousands of companies worldwide and serves as the data source for the annual Fortune 100 Best Companies to Work For® list and more than 70 Best Workplaces ™ lists. Dot is proud to join the ranks of the best companies around the world in this certification, including Salesforce, Hilton, American Express, Adobe, and Cisco.
About Great Place To Work®
Great Place to Work® uses an average of 60 standard statements to determine if a company qualifies for certification. The 60-question survey is designed to measure five key focus areas: credibility, respect, fairness, pride, and camaraderie. Certified companies must receive a positive rating of at least 65 percent from employees on the average Great Place to Work® statements to earn their certification.
Dot’s Survey Results
Dot’s 5,900 employees across the United States and Canada had a three-week window in which to complete the survey last month. 35 percent of Dot Foods and Dot Transportation employees filled out the survey this year. When the results were in, 76 percent of respondents said that Dot is a great place to work. A typical U.S. company scores 59 percent, according to Great Place To Work’s® research.
What Makes Dot a Great Place To Work®?
Of course, there are the tangible benefits of working at Dot Foods—best-in-market benefits, competitive pay, and a variety of other perks. But what resonates most with Dot employees are the intangible benefits they get from being on the Dot team.
Workplace Flexibility
As the world emerges from the COVID-19 pandemic and enters an ever-evolving post-COVID world, Dot’s leadership team recognizes how important good flexibility options and policies are for our employees. Just in the past year, Dot has reimagined and re-worked how those policies are implemented to better align with how our culture has evolved. The goal is to further allow employees to prioritize their families, as well as make Dot a more appealing employer.
IT Software Engineer Adam Wooldridge says that he’s not even surprised to hear that Dot has been certified as a Great Place To Work®.
“Everyone I’ve talked to that is either a current employee or a past employee has nothing but good things to say about working at Dot,” said Adam. “I love working at Dot because they allow me to have a flexible schedule, which enables me to spend time with my family when I need to. I know if I have to leave work early on Friday, I can put in a little extra time throughout the week. That way, when Friday rolls around, I am able to take off early and spend that extra time with family.”
All employees have access to some level of flexibility. With great communication between managers and employees, as well as continuously improving flexibility policies, Dot’s goal is to be as family-oriented as they can be while still servicing our customers to the highest standard.
Career Progression & Advancement
There are many reasons why employees choose to stay at Dot Foods, but Chicago Warehouse Material Handler Jerome Hughes says his primary reason is that you can move up and have a career.
“You show interest and work hard, and they want to work with you and see what you want your future to look like at Dot Foods,” said Jerome. “They want to keep you here and help you progress.”
This progression allows interested employees to have a long career with Dot where they can grow both personally and professionally. This can include internal promotions, lateral moves to develop your skills in other areas of the business, or working on a personal development plan to grow your skills.
“This is a great job to grow from and a great place to work,” said Jerome. “I’m only 32, but I’m already hoping to retire from here.”
Honesty & Transparency
Dot leaders from the top down have worked hard to establish a culture of transparency and honesty with all Dot employees. Dot Foods Tennessee Traditional Customer Delivery Specialist Jonathan Klutts told us that he’s not surprised Dot was designated as a Great Place To Work® and how he really appreciates Dot’s open-door policy.
“Everyone is well taken care of at Dot and [Dot Transportation, Inc. (DTI)],” said Jonathan. “When a company takes care of its employees, of course, it’s going to be a great place to work.”
“Honesty is huge with me—and Dot has been honest with me from day one on compensation, benefits, or anything else I ask,” said Jonathan. “I also love Dot’s open-door policy. You can go in and talk to anyone in management and they’ll make time for you.”
What Dot is Doing to Become an Even Better Place to Work
“We have a committee already hard at work looking at trends from the survey so we know exactly what to work on,” said Dot’s VP of HR Matt Holt. “When we find “hot spots,” we put a plan together to make improvements. We already know about some of the themes employees mentioned in this survey… so we will work on these and other areas of opportunity we see in the survey results.”
A culture of continuous improvement is the name of the game at Dot Foods. But just because we were certified as a Great Place To Work® this year doesn’t mean we won’t continue striving to be the best of the best.
“We are analyzing our results to identify the gaps or opportunities to improve,” said Joe Tracy. “This way, we not only will qualify next year but qualify for the top 100 companies!”