SoapBox receives top honour from Great Place to Work®

We’re honoured and proud to have been awarded the top prize by Great Place to Work® in its first-ever Small Business category (25-49 employees) during a ceremony held at Metro Toronto Convention Centre on April 21!

SoapBox was acknowledged by Great Place to Work® for its high-trust, high-performance workplace culture — a culture that is anchored on constant feedback between front line employees and leadership on how to grow business, better the product, and improve company processes. Leadership gives employees a voice in the overall direction of the company by using its own software platform, SoapBox — a software platform that flattens organizations so they can move faster.

“Being named the best workplace in Canada by Great Place to Work is incredible,” says Brennan McEachran, CEO & Co-founder of SoapBox. “I am very proud of the company we’ve built. Since our first days in the Ryerson DMZ, we believed that culture and happy employees were the key to keeping our customers happy and growing our business.”

SoapBox, located in the heart of downtown Toronto, is home to 29 full-time employees and two full-time dogs. As a startup focused on success, everyone buys into contributing to low-cost ideas for having fun at work. From bi-weekly rituals like “Demo Day” where everyone gets together over a beer to show off the work they’ve completed in the previous two weeks, to a summer team-building retreat in Algonquin Provincial Park that included a now legendary “roast and toast” around the campfire.

“We may not spend a lot on fancy swag or perks, but we all take ownership of our culture,” adds Olivia Truong, Designer at SoapBox. “Everyone pitches in to build the culture, have fun, and create a great company. And that’s an awesome perk you can’t buy.”

“We put a lot of effort into articulating our values and making sure we operate within them everyday,” Brennan explains. “People work at SoapBox because they want to take ownership in the success of the company and build something great. That, and everyone wants in on our secret handshake.”

The list of “Best Workplaces in Canada” is compiled by Great Place to Work® Institute Canada. Two-thirds of the total score comes from a 58-statement survey completed by a random selection of employees. The remaining one-third comes from an in-depth review of the organization’s culture, including an evaluation of HR policies and procedures. This offers a rigorous representation of the organization from an employee perspective, and an overall portrait of the workplace culture. Together, they provide crucial data relative to the five trust-building dimensions of a great place to work®: credibility, respect, fairness, pride, and camaraderie.

This year’s list received over 300 nominations and over 60,000 employees participated in the 2016 “Best Workplaces in Canada” survey.

About Great Place to Work

Great Place to Work® is the global authority on high-trust, high-performance workplace cultures. We are a research and consulting firm whose mission is to build a better society by helping companies transform their workplaces. Through proprietary assessment tools, advisory services, and employer branding programs, including workplace certification and Best Workplaces lists, Great Place to Work® provides the benchmarks, framework, and expertise needed to create, sustain, and recognize outstanding workplace cultures.

In Canada, Great Place to Work® produces the annual 100 Best Workplaces list, released in a national feature in the Globe and Mail. This is part of the world’s largest annual workplace study, which culminates in a series of national lists in almost 50 countries, including the study’s flagship list of 100 Best companies published annually in Fortune magazine. Globally, this survey represents the voices of 11 million employees, including approximately 300,000 from Canada alone. It’s what makes this study so credible: the primary determinant used in selecting winners is an employee survey. There’s only one way to get on this list – and that’s if your employees put you there.

For more information visit  www.greatplacetowork.ca