ACUITY Ranks No. 3 on Fortune List of 100 Best Companies to Work For

March 8, 2015

Wisconsin-based property/casualty insurer ACUITY made Fortune magazine’s new list of the 100 best companies to work for, coming in third place.

Fortune notes that ACUITY, the 62nd-largest property/casualty insurance company in the U.S., made its annual ranking for the first time. The magazine’s article on the company cited number of factors that helped it make the list, including unlimited education reimbursement, compressed workweeks, and a 10 percent contribution by ACUITY to employee 401(k) plans.

ACUITY CEO Ben Salzmann told Fortune that it has also taking other steps to build employee loyalty with other benefits including robust medical plans, and giving employees a say in ACUITY’s future—allowing them to participate in annual strategic planning.

Employees can decide to which charity organizations ACUITY donates. Over the last year, the insurer donated a little more than $1 million to various organizations, according to the Fortune article.

These and other factors have helped ACUITY achieve a 2 percent turnover, according to the story, which also cites something humorous that reflects the level of employee enthusiasm that ACUITY’s policies have generated: a video featuring 40 employees dressed as zombies dubbed ‘ACUITY Zombie Apocalypse,” where they explain that the company will still be a great place to work in the future “after the zombie apocalypse.”

Underscoring the company’s growth trajectory, ACUITY announced in late January that it would hire 150 employees (including processors, underwriters, software developers, technical support staff, claims staff and more) through 2015 to support “strong, sustained business growth” in Wisconsin and in the 23 states in which it does business.

In prepared remarks released at the time, ACUITY Salzmann said that the staff expansion was “not only to respond to our strong growth, but as an investment in our future.”

He added that ACUITY needed “to be certain to have the people and resources in place to maintain our level of world-class service to a growing number of families, individuals and businesses. ”

Last year, industry consulting group Deep Customer Connections surveyed nearly 1,000 agents in 2013 about the top 10 p/c carriers, and ACUITY landed first on DCC’s top 10 list.

Fortune partners each year with Great Place to Work to conduct its annual employee survey that forms the basis of its top 100 list. The survey asks questions, in part about employees’ attitudes concerning management’s credibility, overall job satisfaction, and camaraderie. Other questions focus on areas including pay, benefit questions, hiring practices, training, recognition programs and diversity .