America's Best Large Employers: 22 VA Employers Make Top 500

VIRGINIA — The COVID-19 pandemic “forever changed the workplace” and what makes a good employer, Forbes said with the release of its annual inventory of America’s Best Large Employers.

To compile the annual list, released earlier this month, the business magazine partnered with the market research firm Statista to survey 60,000 Americans working for businesses with at least 1,000 employees.

The highest-ranked company in Virginia, Huntington Ingalls Industries, moved to No. 11 on the list from No. 387, the largest gain of any of the large companies. Based in Newport News, Huntington Ingalls Industries is the nation's largest military shipbuilding company.

Fairfax County Public Schools, with 24,839 employees, ranked 264th on the Forbes' list of best large employers. The school system was the only school district or educational employer in Virginia to make the list.

“We are delighted that FCPS has been recognized as one of America’s top large employers and we credit this to a culture that puts the wellbeing of staff front and center," Sean McDonald, interim assistant superintendent of human resources for FCPS, said in a statement.

"We are proud of our success in recruiting and retaining the best talent in the business and our Back2Fairfax program, which encourages our graduates to return as employees, is just one example of how we foster and grow our world-class workforce," McDonald added.

Five Guys, the burger and fries restaurant chain based in Lorton, ranked 499th on the list. The chain has 5,000 employees.

Along with making the Best Large Employers list, Five Guys was ranked by Forbes as one of the Best Employers for Women in 2018 and as one of the Best Employers for New Grads in 2019.

Survey respondents were asked about such topics as their willingness to recommend their workplace to friends and family, as well as nominate companies other than their own. The final list represents the 500 employers receiving the most recommendations, Forbes said.

The Virginia employers that made the top 200 are:

• 11. Huntington Ingalls Industries, Newport News, 42,000 employees (shipbuilding)
• 72. Capital One, McLean, 52,781 employees (banking and financial services)
• 90. Northrop Grumman, Falls Church, 90,000 employees (aerospace and defense)
• 109. Hilton, McLean, 141,000 employees (hotels)
• 113. Navy Federal Credit Union, Vienna, 13,500 employees (banking and financial services)
• 156. Dominion Energy, Richmond, 17,300 employees (utilities)

Capital One also ranked No. 7 on the list of America's Best Banks, according to Forbes. Northrop Grumman ranked as the 8th best employer for veterans. Sixteen other employers in Virginia ranked in the top 500 on the best large employers list.

Forbes’ Top 10 big employers in the country are:

1. The Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (health care, social)
2. Georgia-based Southern Company (utilities)
3. NASA in the District of Columbia (aerospace, defense)
4. Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center, New York (health care, social)
5. South Carolina-based Michelin Group (automotive, automotive suppliers)
6. Ohio-based Sherwin-Williams (engineering, manufacturing)
7. Minnesota-based Mayo Clinic (health care, social)
8. Arizona-based Carvana (retail, wholesale)
9. University of Texas Southwestern Medical Center (health care, social)
10. Texas-based MD Anderson Cancer Center (health care, social)

Not surprisingly given COVID-19 restrictions, the largest drops were in the restaurant industry, with only 11 companies earning spots on the 2022 large employers list. California-based In-N-Out Burger was the only one to land among the top 200, coming in No. 23.

“We bend over backwards to try to do as many things behind the scenes to continue business as usual,” the franchise owner and president, Lynsi Snyder, told Forbes in November 2020. “It obviously has not looked like business as usual with masks and nearly empty dining rooms.”

U.S. employers are struggling to fill 10.9 million job openings in an environment of 4 percent unemployment.

“Whether working from home or the office, Americans’ priorities have changed,” Forbes said, noting that “what makes a top employer has changed, too.”

Paul McDonald, a senior executive director at Robert Half and a Forbes contributor, said “employees are in control at this point because there’s such a plethora of openings.”

“With the number of job openings today and the choices that good candidates have, you have to move swiftly but diligently,” he told Forbes. “A lot of organizations have realized that, through all the retention efforts and through all the resignations, they’ve had to re-recruit their current staff.”

Forbes said many of the large employers on the list are wrestling with redefining their corporate culture with a largely remote or hybrid workforce where some employees report to the office and others work from home.

In the pre-pandemic era, Genentech, a California-based drug and biotechnology company that ranked 14th on the list, offered on-site benefits such as made-to-order sushi, day care and Friday night parties. Now, the company holds virtual office hours with executives and gives employees two hours of “protected time” when they can take a break or work uninterrupted on projects.

>>Check out the full list of America's Best Large Employers on Forbes' website.

Patch editor Beth Dalbey contributed to this article.