TWO AUSTRALIAN companies – BHP Billiton and Woolworths – have been listed in their industry categories in the 2008 rankings of “The World’s Most Admired Companies.”
TWO AUSTRALIAN companies –BHP Billiton and Woolworths – have been listed in their industry categories in the 2008 rankings of “The World’s Most Admired Companies.”
BHP Billiton was ranked number three in the global list of the most admired mining companies and Woolworths was ranked among the finalists in the food and drug store category.
“What makes The World’s Most Admired Companies list so significant is that it is peers judging peers about what distinguishes companies from the pack. In Australia we know both BHP Billiton and Woolworths are leaders, but they are also leaders on a global stage’’ said Richard Hardwick, managing director of Hay Group Pacific, who released the results in conjunction with Fortune Magazine.
Computer giant Apple has topped the overall global listings for the first time, followed by General Electric and Toyota.
Leveraging reward investments is one key characteristic of the most admired companies, according to further research by the Hay Group into what links these top companies.
The research also found that local organisations benchmarked favourably against the World’s Most Admired. For example most local organisations clearly have articulated reward strategies in place. In addition these programs are aligned with organisational performance – when the organisation is performing well, employees have been rewarded for their contribution (46 per cent Australia& NZ versus 56 per cent WMAC).
The two areas where local organisations did not benchmark as favourably were in their confidence in recognising superior performers through reward programs – (46 per cent Australia & NZ versus 86 per cent WMAC) – and in measuring return on investment of the reward programs in place (13 per cent Australia & NZ versus 64 per cent WMAC).
Hay Group has collaborated with Fortune Magazine annually since 1997 to identify, select and rank companies on The World’s Most Admired Companies and America’s Most Admired Companies lists and uncover the business practices that make these companies both highly regarded and successful
World’s top ten
1 Apple
2 General Electric
3 Toyota Motor
4 Berkshire Hathaway
5 Procter & Gamble
6 FedEx
7 Johnson & Johnson
8 Target (US)
9 BMW
10 Microsoft.
