Irvine, Calif., Sep 29, 2015 MIND Research Institute has been named among the 100 Best Workplaces for Women by Great Place to Work® and Fortune this week, which surveyed more than 135,600 female employees at 637 companies on the quality and fairness of their workplaces to glean the results.
“MIND is a great place to work for both women and men,” said Kathy Naylor, MIND’s Vice President of HR and Talent. “But we’re delighted that our female colleagues find our culture of autonomy, trust, respect, creativity, flexibility and recognition creates an inclusive and productive work environment for them.”
Currently, 42% of MIND’s executive team is female, and 50% of its 200 employees across the country are women. Read more highlights about the organization at Great Place to Work review for MIND.
“What really stands out to me about working at MIND is that the people here truly love each other and want each other to succeed,” writes MIND’s Dorene Uhrich in a blog. “My manager has helped me get the right experiences and training I need to be successful in not just my current role, but also my career, and balance that with my personal goals.”
MIND’s Core Values – which guide both its math programs and the organizational culture – fall into three categories: people, problem solving and learning.
“Diversity is one of our core values at MIND, and one that’s essential to our ability to innovate and problem solve – as it is for any organization,” said Matthew Peterson, Ph.D., CEO and co-founder of MIND. “That’s why, in addition to being an inclusive workplace for women, we want to leverage our game-based math programs to engage and empower girls with the math skills necessary for them to become women with careers in science, technology, engineering and math.”
MIND’s 200 employees across the country develop and support its flagship ST Math® game-based learning program to more than 800,000 students at 2,500 schools. As a social benefit organization, MIND partners with companies and foundations to help get the program into high-need schools, where it’s been repeatedly shown to double or triple students’ growth in math proficiency. The organization’s MathMINDs movement, which aims to shift the cultural perception of math from being scary and frustrating to exciting and essential, takes math beyond the classroom with math fairs, family math night, the national K-12 Game-a-thon and math camp.
“The companies on this list are leaders who recognize the strategic importance of creating workplaces that attract and support the best talent in their industries,” says Michael Bush, CEO of Great Place to Work United States. “While specialized programs to support women’s equal access to opportunity are often strategic, in many ways it is just as important – and challenging for leaders – to establish a pattern of inclusiveness throughout everyday workplace interactions since these rely on everyone to overcome their blind spots. Ranking on this list is a great indicator that these companies’ efforts to create great workplaces are resonating throughout their teams.”
MIND and the other winning companies were selected based on evaluations by over 135,600 female employees on Great Place to Work’s Trust Index© employee survey. Women considered everything from the fairness of their company’s promotions, to who has access to information and leadership, the level of support for employees’ personal lives, and the degree of inclusiveness and connection they feel with colleagues. Scores also take into account how well-represented women are within the workforce, management and executive positions; how positively women experience their workplace’s fairness; and how favorable women’s experiences are compared to the 138,000 men also surveyed.
Across the 637 companies studied, Great Place to Work found that men’s and women’s experiences were most likely to differ on measures assessing the fairness of their workplaces – as well as several measures rating their access to communication and involvement in workplace decision-making. By contrast, researchers’ analysis of women and men’s results show that the 100 winning workplaces create a more consistent and inclusive environment for both genders across a range of day-to-day trust-building behaviors, including employees’ access to special recognition, fair treatment regardless of role, and management’s approachability.
About MIND Research Institute
MIND Research Institute is a neuroscience and education social benefit organization, dedicated to ensuring that all students are mathematically equipped to solve the world’s most challenging problems. MIND's distinctive visual approach to math and problem-solving is the basis of its innovative, research-proven ST Math® programs for elementary and secondary schools. The visually-based ST Math program has been shown to double or triple schools’ growth rates in math proficiency. MIND's programs currently reach 800,000 students and 31,000 teachers in 2,500 schools in 40 states. For more information, visit www.mindresearch.org.
For more information contact:
Christine Byrd
MIND Research Institute
949-345-8636
cbyrd@mindresearch.org
Download our corporate backgrounder here.
