It is not enough to just employ people, pay them a salary and make them work. An organisation should also ensure that ethical labour practices are followed, where the rights and dignity of employees are respected, where every kind of diversity, be it cultural, ethnic or in terms of gender is honoured. Ethical labour practices also include fair wages, safe working conditions, reasonable working hours, and the eradication of child labour and forced labour.
Every individual deserves a workplace where there is no discrimination in any form, where employment decisions are based only on the requirements of the job. Every employee deserves an organisation which respects their work-life balance, which is the need of the hour in today’s date. Lack of work-life balance can lead to decreased productivity, mental and physical health issues and reduced loyalty towards the employer.
How happy employees are in an organisation, for how long they have been associated with an organisation, how likely they recommend their organisation to other people are all factors which reflect a company’s approach towards its staff. In this regard, let’s take a look into the top 10 companies following ethical labour practices in India and abroad. In short, these are the best workplaces globally and in India.
Infosys
Founded in 1981 by seven engineers having a budget of $250, Infosys is a NYSE listed global consulting and IT services company with more than 317k employees. Infosys operates in over 50 countries and has substantially contributed in making India a preferred choice for software services talent.
Infosys is the only Indian company featured in the TIME Magazine’s top 100 ‘World’s Best Companies 2023’ list. The Bengaluru-based professional services firm has grabbed the 64th spot in the top 100 list.
Infosys was recognised as one of the World’s Most Ethical Companies in 2023 for the third consecutive year.
Infosys was recognized as one of India’s Best Employers among Nation-Builders 2021 by the Great Place to Work Institute. The IT major was recognized for generating large-scale employment, its substantial outlay of funds for Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), delivering significant impact to the community, and contributing to the digital infrastructure. “The company’s employees, randomly selected by Great Place to Work Institute to give anonymous feedback, reinforced their trust in the management of the organization, pride in their job, and great camaraderie among colleagues,” as per an official statement.
Infosys prioritises employees’ health and mental health care. The company offers health insurance, dental insurance, vision insurance, life insurance, disability insurance, accidental death and dismemberment insurance, and a health savings account to its employees. The IT Company is popular for offering flexible work hours, work from home options, and shift allowances for employees who work shifts. Infosys offers job training, conferences, and other training to keep employees up to date with market changes. Employees also enjoy paid holidays, paid sick days, and sabbaticals. Infosys provides retirement benefits, including a 401(k) plan and pension benefits, to eligible employees.
Apart from the above, Infosys also offers childcare benefits, family medical leave, company-sponsored outings, pet-friendly offices, and employee referral bonuses. Employees enjoy outings sponsored by the company, pet-friendly environment, and remote work programme.
TCS
One of the largest IT services companies in the world, Tata Consultancy Services or TCS is a part of the esteemed Tata Group, which is known for its strong ethics and employee-friendly work environment. The five core Tata values forming the foundation of its business are integrity, responsibility, excellence, pioneering and unity. TCS is one of the best companies to work for due to its pioneering employee engagement and talent development initiatives.
“TCS was certified as a top employer for the 9th consecutive year by the Top Employers Institute, a global authority that honours excellence in people practices. TCS was named a top employer in 32 countries and regions, including Europe, the UK, the Middle East, North America, Latin America, and South-East Asia. Evaluation was done on the basis of six fundamental HR domains and topics, including work environment, diversity and inclusion, talent acquisition, people strategy, well-being, and learning.
TCS received special appreciation for two industry-first initiatives—the Engagement with Purpose framework and the TCS Elevate program for people development. The ‘Engagement with Purpose’ framework redefines employee engagement by focusing on the holistic well-being of employees. TCS employees have benefitted from the various lifestyle, social, community and learning initiatives. TCS Elevate, a learning-based talent transformation program calibrated to cater to all levels, has fuelled the career growth trajectory of 428K+ employees so far,” as per an official statement released by TCS in March this year.
TCS was one of the early companies to launch a mental well-being initiative for its associates. TCS Cares offers free access to professional medical help and self-help tools for mental healthcare for employees and their families. TCS Fit4Life is another unique initiative that promotes holistic wellbeing by encouraging associates to eat healthy, walk more, exercise regularly and destress for a better quality of life.
TCS employs a diverse workforce of 603,305 employees in 55 countries representing 153 nationalities (as of December 31, 2023). Women make up 35.7% of its workforce.
However, in November last year, IT workers’ union NITES (Nascent Information Technology Employees Senate) approached the Ministry of Labour and Employment against the alleged “unethical transfer practices” of Tata Consultancy Services (TCS), as per media reports. NITES issued a statement saying it received more than 180 complaints that TCS has allegedly been “systematically forcing” more than 2,000 employees to transfer to different cities without proper notice or consultation, causing immense hardship to them and their families.
NTPC
India’s largest integrated energy conglomerate, NTPC Limited, has been recognized as one of the “World’s Best Employers 2023” in the Forbes World’s Best Employers list 2023 released on 10th Oct 2023. It ranked 261st out of top 700 companies in the World ranking and is the only Indian PSU to figure in the list. This is a testimony that the people practices at NTPC are at par with the top companies in the world.
This recognises NTPC’s progressive and “People before PLF” approach, excellence in development and management of its Human Resources through continuous process improvement, creating a caring, learning and engaging workplace, employee well-being and care and creating a meaningful, collaborative employee experience by putting the needs of employees first and adopting people practices aligned strategically to business needs.
NTPC provides equal opportunities in employment and offers an inclusive work place and work culture in which all employees are treated equally with respect and dignity. NTPC has various initiatives that seek to enhance the creativity, innovation and spirit of healthy competition among its employees.
NTPC provides full medical cover to the employee and his/her dependents. The medical cover consists of the cost of consultation, hospitalization, medical tests and hospitalization of all dependent members of the family. NTPC owned hospitals provide round the clock service to its employees posted at NTPC townships. The PSU has also empanelled over 250 hospitals across 25 cities for providing specialist treatment to its employees.
Regular feedback is taken from employees by conducting organizational climate surveys and employee satisfaction surveys. The purpose is to seek employee feedback on various systems. Through surveys, employees can contribute towards improvement of various systems within the organization by giving their valuable feedback.
NTPC has consistently featured in the list of India’s Top 50 Best Companies to Work for the past 14 years in a row and was recognized as “Laureate” by the prestigious Great Place to Work Institute. The PSU ranked 15th in Asia and India’s best Public Sector Enterprise, the Best Workplace in Energy, Oil & Gas Sector and one of the Top 30 India’s Best Workplaces in Manufacturing 2021.
NTPC Limited was honoured by “ET Edge – A Times Group Initiative” as one of the “Best Organisations for Women for 2024” at an event held in Mumbai on 21st March, 2024.
ICICI Bank
Industrial Credit and Investment Corporation of India (ICICI) Bank Limited was incorporated in 1994. ICICI Bank features among the top private-sector banks in India, offering a wide range of banking products and financial services to both corporate and retail customers. ICICI bank is the parent company of ICICI Lombard, ICICI Securities, ICICI Prudential, ICICI Home Finance Ltd and ICICI Direct, among others.
ICICI Bank has recently emerged as the ‘Best Company to Work For in India’ as per a survey by the ‘Business Today’ magazine in association with an HR solutions company. The survey involved feedback from 43,000 employees across various sectors. The Bank also maintained its position as the ‘Best Company to Work For in India’ in the BFSI sector for the seventh time in the last eight years.
The bank is known for having an employee-friendly environment and maintains a positive work culture. Employee job satisfaction is prioritised by the management. The bank offers facilities like pick-and-drop services, a gymnasium, a cafeteria, hosts team breakfast, lunch, dinner, outings on a regular basis to reward employees for their performance and achievements.
Employees at ICICI Bank get life, medical, and health insurance. Disability and disease coverage is also provided. ICICI bank is known for offering good salary to its employees. The bank focuses on training existing employees to ensure their development and provides them with opportunities to grow.
ICICI Bank encourages diversity in its workforce and gender sensitivity. As on March 31, 2022, the Bank had 105,844 employees (including contractual employees); 31% of them were women.
The Bank’s philosophy of meritocracy and equal opportunity in its people’s decisions has led to a large number of leadership positions being held by women over the last two decades. To cater to the safety and life stage needs of women employees, the Bank offers benefits like offering women employees with cost of travel and stay, for a child up to a certain age and a caregiver, during official travel. Further, the Bank has a liberal leave policy for women employees. These include Child Care Leave, Adoption Leave and Fertility Leave, among others.
The Bank is an equal opportunity employer and seeks to ensure that the workplace is free of any kind of harassment or inappropriate behaviour. The bank’s management communicates regularly with employees regarding the mechanism for raising complaints and the need for right conduct by all employees. The bank ensures that all complaints are handled promptly and effectively with utmost sensitivity and confidentiality.
HDFC Bank
HDFC Bank began operations in 1995. As per an announcement made by the Bank in March 2024, HDFC Bank has been certified as ‘Great Place to Work’ by Great Place to Work Institute for the Year 2024-2025. The certification is the result of an anonymous employee survey conducted by the third-party global authority on recognising high-trust and performance culture at workplaces.
This recognition acknowledges the Bank’s commitment towards fostering a culture of camaraderie, fairness, respect, pride, and credibility amongst its employees. HDFC Bank was also certified as ‘Great Place to Work’ for 2020-21, 2021-22 and 2023-24. HDFC Bank has ranked 8th in the Business Today ranking of Top 25 ‘Best Companies to Work for in India.’
HDFC Bank offers a unique Mediclaim policy for the employees which provide coverage upto 6 people in one policy. It covers the employee and spouse, two children and one set of parents (own or in-laws). The Bank also provides Mediclaim to its employees even after retirement. This provides coverage to employee and their spouse.
Furthermore, the Bank gives retired employees, an option of extended customized plans to increase insured amount.
The Bank provides an on-site crèche for young children at two of its large office locations. Besides, the Bank has also partnered with day-care facilities across several locations in the country to offer fees at concessional rates for employees. In special cases, the Bank also has provisions for Part time work Arrangements, to help employees continue employment in case of health issues faced by them, their spouse, children, parents.
HDFC Bank focuses on inclusivity and gender equality in alignment with SDG 5 (Gender Equality). The Bank had 2,08,066 employees as of December 31, 2023. The Bank is a fair employer and does not discriminate amongst its employees and hence does not record information on persons with disabilities. The Bank has an employee association that is recognized by the management.
HDFC Bank has a Prevention of Sexual Harassment (POSH) Policy in place. The Bank makes sure that women working late hours, are not alone and are accompanied by a colleague if not a team. For providing easy access to people with disabilities, the Bank has built about 490 ramps across its branches and offices. Further in large back offices, there are specially designed toilets for the differently abled.
Tech Mahindra
Tech Mahindra is a global consulting service and systems integrator that operates in over 90+ countries. Committed to diversity, equity, and inclusion, Tech Mahindra’s policies support gender equality and LGBTQ+ rights. The organisation also takes care of the needs of its differently abled employees. Diversity workshops are hosted to ensure everyone feels valued. The company allows flexible working hours and remote working as it focuses on employee wellbeing and productivity.
“We have implemented hybrid work policies that not only allow flexibility for our employees, but also ensure business continuity and growth for our customers. To this day, we have opted for a hybrid model with the majority of the workforce still working from home and employ hundreds of interaction specialists. Our very effective work-from-home solutions run on a platform that is extremely secure and makes use of Mahindra’s operational procedures and techniques to make sure that best in class standards are being followed,” Tech Mahindra’s Chief People Officer Richard Lobo told Sustainability Magazine in an interview.
Tech Mahindra is a women-centric organisation, which ensures an inclusive work environment especially for women. The company’s policies on maternity leave, flexible working hours, and anti-harassment are progressive. Individual differences based on age, ethnicity, race, lifestyle, and social status are respected in the organisation, which has programmes, policies, and initiatives to promote cultural diversity.
Tech Mahindra has been recognised among the “Best Organisations for Women 2024” by ET Now. Tech Mahindra ranked 4th in the Golden Peacock HR Excellence Award 2023.
DHL Supply Chain
DHL Supply Chain India Private Limited features in the list of “Great Place to Work” by the Great Place to Work Institute for the Year 2024-2025. In the Great Place to Work Institute survey, 74 percent of DHL employees spoke positively about the organisation.
Headquartered in Westerville, Ohio, US, DHL Supply Chain, part of the DHL Group, is a global leader in the contract logistics market offering innovative solutions at every link of the supply chain. These solutions include warehousing, transport as well as value-added services such as Lead Logistics Partner (LLP), Real Estate Solutions, Service Logistics, packaging, and e-fulfilment along strategic industry verticals.
DHL Supply Chain has been adopting and deploying various technology initiatives that have helped drive employee retention across its operations. The company tracks its employee’s acceptance and enjoyment of its automation and technology, according to CIO of North America Sally Miller who is also the company’s global digital transformation officer.
“We do find that they really like it. Our turnover in these sites where significant technology is applied is much lower. There are a lot of recruiting, retention and focus that we have to do to make our associates like where they work and make them as efficient as possible,” Miller told HR Dive portal.
DHL runs an Employee Assistance Programme which gives employees access to a free confidential helpline offering them support for the challenges they are facing, including counselling sessions, legal and financial advice. Employees and their families can seek support from a qualified General Physician through the company’s 24/7 GP Service. The company’s remote wellbeing support offers help on topics like parenting, menopause, fertility and other health issues. Employees enjoy retail and lifestyle discount at online and offline retailers, and also discounts at gyms, health clubs, leisure centres, bootcamps and fitness studios.
Office perks include cab/shuttle facility, cafeteria, free meal, child care facility and office gym. Employees are entitled for health insurance.
Samsung Electronics
For the second consecutive year, Samsung Electronics features at #1 of Forbes World’s Best Employers 2023. To create the list, Forbes partnered with market research firm Statista, which surveyed more than 170,000 employees in over 50 countries who work for multinational companies and institutions.
Under the Employee Assistance Programme, Samsung employees and their families receive world-class therapeutic services and support through our health network. Samsung provides access to a multitude of medical plans which all include prescription coverage and wellness resources for its employees. There is also a telehealth service under which employees can connect with board-certified doctors via video conference around the clock.
The company offers a Paid Time Off policy that allows all regular, full-time employees to accrue the equivalent of 20 days per year, increasing with tenure, in addition to company holidays. Employees can flex or change their start and end times within specified “core hours” while still working a standard workday. They can also leave the office early on Fridays during the summer months.
The Samsung 401(k) Plan supports employees’ financial wellness by empowering them to save money for retirement and other long-term financial goals. Samsung will help alleviate employees’ student loan debt with annual contributions. Employees can enrol in select lifestyle management programs and get reimbursed for courses on stress management, tobacco cessation and others.
The company offers up to 12 weeks of fully paid parental leave. The Healthy Pregnancies, Healthy Babies compensated programme is designed to support female employees during pregnancy and in the weeks following birth. Employees receive personalized guidance, education, emotional support and 24/7 Nurse Care Manager throughout the family-building journey.
Employees can focus on their fitness with reimbursement for gym membership, personal fitness training, group exercise classes etc. Samsung provides an incentive for biometric screenings, PSAs, pap smears and mammograms to support long-term health.
Microsoft
For the second consecutive year, Microsoft features at #2 of Forbes World’s Best Employers 2023. Microsoft features on #18 on the list of 20 companies on Glassdoor’s 2024 ranking.
Headquartered at Redmond, Washington Microsoft topped TIME and Statista’s list of the World’s best companies of 2023 alongside companies like Apple, Alphabet, and Meta. Ranking was done on the bsiss of employee satisfaction, revenue growth, and sustainability efforts. Microsoft scored 96.46 out of the possible 100, with a top ranking regarding employee satisfaction. As highlighted by TIME, the criteria was based on “a formula of revenue growth, employee-satisfaction surveys, and rigorous environmental, social, and corporate governance (ESG, or sustainability) data.”
Microsoft follows a hybrid work culture in terms of both workplace and working hours. So basically, employees can work from anywhere, anytime!
The company offers good salary, health insurance and retirement benefits to its employees. It also provides competitive pay, bonuses and stock awards to eligible employees based on individual performance. It respects diversity and inclusion and is committed to the principle of pay equity.
Through Employee Resource Groups, social and networking groups, the company helps find opportunities to foster personal connections across global teams, participate in local engagements, and take part in global sustainability. It offers leave for new parents and family caregiver leave, adoption assistance, parenting classes and family support programs, as well as subsidized and discounted childcare and back-up care for children, adults, and elders.
Employees enjoy flexible work schedules, generous vacation, and holidays to spend with family or pursue their hobbies. From financial education and tuition assistance to specific program training, Microsoft employees can expand their knowledge on different topics.
Alphabet Inc
Alphabet Inc features at rank #3 on Forbes World’s Best Employers list 2023 released on 10th Oct 2023. The company also features on LinkedIn’s annual list of top companies, revealing the best workplaces in the US, alongside names like JP Morgan Chase & Co., Amazon and Wells Fargo, which was published in April, 2024.
Alphabet is the parent company for many prominent subsidiaries, like Google, YouTube, Fitbit, Verily, and Waze. Google’s co-founders, Larry Page and Sergey Brin, created Alphabet as a holding company to separate Google’s various businesses and projects into different entities.
Alphabet offers ideal mobility solutions to its customers. It provides sustainable mobility solutions like operational leasing of (electric) vehicles and bikes, flexible short- or long-term solutions and through consulting they offer expert guidance on fleet management. Headquartered in Mountain View, California, United States, Alphabet Inc has 190,234 employees as on October 2023.
The company offers attractive and personalized salary package and other benefits like paid internships, assistance with paying off employee’s student loans, retirement benefits, has financial education programmes for employees. It further provides health and wellness benefits like health insurance, childcare benefits, on-site fitness centre, primary and non-primary caregiver leave, medical insurance, mental health benefit, bereavement leave.
Employees enjoy flexible work arrangements like hybrid and remote working to maintain a healthy work-life balance.
