Asia’s Best Workplaces’ Small and Medium companies share their efforts in ensuring workplace practices that benefit all employees, regardless of their role or what they do.
📌 This year, Asia’s Best Workplaces™ have on average 88% of employees that report having a positive employee experience. For the average global workforce, only 55% of workers report a similarly positive experience. Great Place to Work ® identifies Best Workplaces in Asia™ by surveying over 1 million employees in Asia and the Middle East about the key factors that create great workplaces for all and analyzing company workplace programs impacting over 4.7 million employees in the region.
“At Coda Payments, our people are at the heart of what we do – to offer the best digital experiences to our customers worldwide. Hence, we have a vibrant company culture where everyone is encouraged to embrace positive and constructive feedback, and we provide people with autonomy and support to excel.
82% of Codans feel that Coda provides a healthy working environment with attractive benefits catering to our global workforce, including a work-from-home (WFH) allowance, home equipment allowance, wellness benefit that supports physical/mental/emotional well-being, and an employee assistance program.
With people in over 35 countries, we provide flexibility in working arrangements to support each individual’s work-life preferences; 92% feel that they can collaborate and work effectively with our current WFH setup. We embrace our cultural diversity in our #codalife Slack channel and we welcome new joiners from their first week by assigning them a culture buddy to help them navigate and understand our core values. In addition, we strive to maintain a fun and engaging environment. The Philippines team does this through monthly team bonding events, virtual holiday gatherings, and an active social Slack channel.”
“Mars is a private, family-owned company and Mars Petcare serves pets in more than 130 countries. In the Philippines, working at Mars Pet Nutrition means being part of a fun, high-energy, fast-paced environment surrounded by colleagues who are passionately driven by our purpose to create “A Better World for Pets”.
Our pet-friendly offices ensure our paw-rents (parents) need not worry about leaving their fur babies at home when they engage in purposeful dialogues and collaborations in the office. We also maintain agile work arrangements to offer work flexibility, empowering and trusting associates to manage personal and professional responsibilities.
With Mars’ accelerated growth in the Philippines, we recognize that our primary catalyst is our people. Therefore, new associates are assimilated through a structured 12-month onboarding plan, combined with individual developmental journeys marked by tailored on-the-job training, mentoring experiences, and formal learning opportunities.
We take great pride that our diverse, inclusive culture – driven by The Five Principles – defines how we are one of the best companies to work for. Overall, Mars invests in our talents, continually nurtures Associates’ well-being, and trusts and empowers associates to live their best lives in bringing their best selves to deliver meaningful, purpose-driven work every day!”
On Purpose:
“Our employees say that working in boxgreen has given them the opportunity to learn, grow and do what they are best at. It can be challenging at times however, many have also found it fulfilling at the same time. Our employees also feel empowered and happy at work.
The key lies in productivity and trusting employees to get the job done in a productive and efficient manner. This principle of trust has been built over the past few years, giving employees flexibility and autonomy to manage their own time and tasks.
There is also a great sense of belonging at boxgreen. We had a company retreat recently and to our surprise, a handful of employees suggested a retreat may not be ideal at that moment due to the economic instability. However, the management team decided that this was important as it allowed the employees to take a break and foster bonds with other colleagues. Employees have also said that their biggest takeaway from the trip was getting to know everyone better!”
“At Openspace, we start with purpose. Ours is to invest with Active Intelligence. That informs how we think and act – and has shaped our working culture. We prioritize diversity as a business imperative, ensuring that nobody needs to leave their differences at the door and deploy varied experiences in solving complex challenges.
We encourage our team to get out into the world, and have now formalized an annual 4-week Work From Anywhere policy. We also give employees the freedom to travel between our offices, on regular work sponsored trips, and also trust them to take control of when they are, or aren't, in any of our permanent regional offices.
In the end, we can’t live up to our purpose if we are glued to a desk. It also helps us drive team inclusion and it allows us to foster a sense of belonging.
In 2022, we brought the entire firm together for a 3-day trip to Phuket. The next key focus for this year is mental health – for which we are adding some valuable employee benefits to our extensive suite of benefits. Ultimately, we encourage people to have fun through their work – and we provide them with the resources to do so.”
On Inclusion:
“As one of Qavalo’s pioneering employees and as Director of Audit and Compliance for six years now, I’ve seen the company grow exponentially and thrive over the years. Our vision “quality of life through quality healthcare” is embedded in our daily work, which adds value to the global care continuum that ultimately contributes to the effective delivery of quality patient care. Our innovation efforts aim to benefit the business, our community, and the rest of society altogether.
The company’s core values allow us to grow personally and professionally. These inspire us to go above and beyond our roles to achieve our shared goals. At the same time, Qavalo’s leadership is guided by compassion and ensure that our team members have the opportunity to balance their work and personal lives, with programs that support flexible working arrangements and promote positive well-being.
As an organization, Qavalo celebrates individuality and encourages the team to share their ideas for the purpose of active collaboration. Qavalo cultivates an environment where everyone recognizes each other's strengths, shares ideas, and engages meaningfully to drive collective growth and success.
For all of these reasons and more, Qavalo is truly a great place to work, and I look forward to the next milestone and more years with Qavalo,” says Carmela Malaza, Director of Audit and Compliance.
“At RICE, putting our people ahead of everything else is a priority. This is because it’s the right thing to do, and because we know that a more engaged team – especially in the competitive industry that we are in – means a better relationship and results for clients, partners and vendors.
We want to ensure that every individual feels empowered and has equal access to opportunities.
We celebrate individuality and differences so that we can provide a space where everyone feels safe and has access to diverse perspectives. We also practise open communication and listening.
This is done by encouraging everyone to share their voice, giving people autonomy and support to shape their career path, thereby being the company that they feel proud to be a part of. It is also important for us to stay true to being a learning organization, by providing resources and support to help employees grow and achieve their goals.
As cliché as it sounds, we really do believe in building a culture that is fun and engaging, so that people can enjoy their work and lives as much as possible!”
On Well-being:
“Balsam has cultivated a strong community of people who share the same goal and care about each other’s growth and well-being. As a copywriter who works in Balsam, I found not only opportunities to hone my technical skills, but also teammates to grow with professionally. As a team member, I feel nurtured through Balsam’s many holistic initiatives that cover everything from our mental health to our individual career growth. We have regular one-to-one sessions with our managers, wellness days, fitness classes, individual resources for continuous learning, and annual career navigation chats, to name a few. These benefits set us up for success, equipping and empowering us to effectively function within our teams.
The company has also established a culture of feedback, which has made working here extra meaningful because we know we can trust one another to course-correct when we need it. Leaders and managers also expect us to think critically and give them feedback when necessary.
I feel incredibly fortunate to be part of a company that says they care about their people, and actually truly care” says Krissa, a Balsam employee.
“Livit is one of the rare companies that has successfully brought its company values to life, not just to have them printed on mugs or walls. I’m proud to be a part of Livit where diversity is celebrated and maintaining a healthy work-life balance is highly encouraged,” says Johanes Raymond Hasiholan, Brand and Social Media Manager.
Livit takes pride in being a place where people perform, play, grow, and most of all, explore new ways to live and work. Creating and maintaining a great work environment is a team effort, and being certified as a Great Place to Work™ and being ranked as the 3rd Best Workplace in Indonesia only validates our achievements in that regard. We constantly put in the effort and resources to elevate our overall employee experience, well-being and continuous growth.
Some examples of how we have achieved that include implementing extensive and generous people policies; deploying innovative processes and tools; following a governance method (Holacracy) that distributes autonomy and decision-making power throughout the team and leading by example when it comes to our values and mission.”
“PANDR is a community that honors its employees by having people at the center of every decision we make. We ensure that we profile new hires correctly and highlight their strengths to guarantee that they land a role they will excel in and a client with whom they can build a strong work relationship. We see from our experience that a teammate who is an ideal match with their position becomes more productive, flexible, and happier because they see pursuit in their work.
We conduct monthly employee engagement training to promote continuous growth among our teammates. We also have quarterly mental health webinars facilitated by licensed professionals. Our top priority is our teammates' well-being.
To embody our PANDR’s fun and active culture, we organize company-wide events such as sportsfest, team lunches and dinners, and parties to keep everyone engaged and their efforts recognized. Through these, they become more efficient, and their morale stays high and robust. Aside from all these, we celebrate diversity and uniqueness.
Our teammates’ efforts and contributions have catapulted PANDR to where it is today. PANDR’s universe is driven by experience and growing together. By serving our employees, in turn, we serve our clients.
“At TC Acoustic, we live by 3 simple principles. They are:
TC Cares: People Above Profits
During the peak of Covid when retail stores were shuttered, our freelance promoters were out of a job. Through #TCCares initiative, we provided prompt financial help for up to 70 of our freelance promoters and even former employees. They received 50 to 100% of their monthly pay to tide through the months when they had no work.
As our CEO says, ”When people feel cared for, they will also care for the company.” This is one of the many ways we put People Above Profits, and Relationships Above Revenue.
What we celebrate, praise and reward becomes our culture.
During our bi-weekly culture town halls, department leaders share about staff who live out their values. One of these stories was regarding a customer who raved about our service after she had left an inaccurate phone number for us to contact her. Our employee earnestly dialled several different permutations of her number and managed to contact her about her purchase, and we recognized him for it. This is just one of the many stories that inspire our staff and reinforce our company culture.
Empower young staff; embrace fresh ideas
We are staffed mostly by millennials and Gen Zs. Our staff team’s average age is just 27 years old. In TC Acoustic, it is common to see interns highlight problems, share ideas, and change how we do things. We actively involve our younger and newer staff – together with the senior and experienced – and we empower them to be leaders. An 18-year-old intern was our media spokesperson for the biggest product launch event of the year.”
Great Place to Work® recognizes what it takes to build company pride and to foster a positive employee experience as a great place to work For All, and it shows how investing in people is a proven path to business success. Find out how you can start here.
Daphne Lee
Daphne believes in building community-relatable content, telling stories through narratives that add value in today’s workplace and in culture-building. Her idea of a great workplace is one that thrives on openness, support and inclusivity while building trust and working towards a common business growth and purpose. A journalist, she spent 15 years writing for trade publications, lifestyle magazines and broadsheet supplements. Daphne was also active in the Parent Support Group of her daughters’ school, chairing the volunteer-run committee for 3 years. A mum of two teenagers and two adopted dogs, she enjoys riding on her trusty bicycle to discover new sights and sounds in Singapore.
