January 21, 2010

SCJ -- despite profit-sharing cut -- still best place to work

Fortune magazine has, for the 10th time since 1998, recognized SC Johnson as one of the 100 best companies to work for in America.

The company fell two places in the rankings, from 81st last year to 83rd this year. Fortune notes, "For the first time in 92 years no profit-sharing checks were issued, but the household-products maker was able to stick to its 123-year-old no layoff policy."

There was no mention of the sale of 50% of JohnsonDiversey and the loss here of 200 jobs (and worldwide from 13,500 to 10,800).

Perhaps Fortune was balancing those negatives with the opening this week -- the big invitation-only party (no, we didn't get one) is Friday night -- of Fortaleza Hall, part of Project Honor with its "Community Building" for SCJ employees. The building will include -- besides the Carnauba airplane hanging overhead -- a dining room, fitness center, bank, company store and concierge service. (Not too shabby, especially in a community with 17% unemployment.)

"It is an honor to be recognized for the tenth time," said Chairman and CEO Fisk Johnson. "SC Johnson has a long history of being recognized as a great place to work and we are thrilled to be on the list, especially when many companies are facing uncertainties."

Johnson Financial Group was ranked far higher than SCJ itself, coming out as the 22nd best company to work for in the U.S. (up from 25th last year). Fortune writes: "Employees who fall on hard times know they can count on Johnson for support. For instance, pay will be kept intact while an associate is out due to crisis. Says CEO Richard Hansen: JFG will always "do what is right."

SCJ was ranked 28th in Fortune's "Big Pay" listing. "Senior Research Assistants," said to be the most common job title, earn, on average, $113,381. Johnson Financial Group ranked 29th in the annual pay listing; its most common job, Commercial Relationship Manager III, earns $112,296.

Fortune's rankings are based one-third on the company's responses to questions about benefits and pay, and two-thirds on a random sample survey sent to employees.

The full story will be in Fortune's Feb. 8 issue, which is now online here. And here
is SCJ's reaction.

37 comments:

  1. Imagine what the unemployment rate would be if they left.

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  2. I think the profit-sharing is hanging in the new building on 14th St.

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  3. If you are going to make editorial remarks, you could at least done some homework. The Award for "Best Place to Work" was to SC Johnson and Son, Inc. SC Johnson did not sell 50% of the Johnson-Diversy business because they did not own Johns-Diversy. SC Johnson spun off a company called "Johnson Professional" 10 years ago and that company is now a totally an independant corporation. The SC Johnson Company has no ownership of that spun off company, nor is there any shared stock. It was Johnson Professional which sold it's polymer business to BASF and aquired the Diversy Business - not SC Johnson.

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  4. Anon 12:54. Sorry to bust your bubble, but the Johnson family still owns 50% of Diversey.

    See here.

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  5. Pete- The family does still own 50% of Diversey, but that still doesn't make Diversey part of SCJ. You make no sense..... Your logic would include Johnson Outdoors and Johnson Financial as part of SCJ as well. IRS doesn't see it that way.

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  6. Sorry to bust YOUR bubble, Pete! Anonymous is absolutely correct.

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  7. Pete, I own stock in IBM, I also own stock in Time-Warner - that does not mean that IBM owns Time-Warner or vise versa...

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  8. It's amazing to me that here we have a company - SCJ which for 10 years has been honored as one of the 100 best to work for and yet in Racine 90% of the posters have nothing nice to say. Apparently this is another case of "no good deed goes unpunished". Of the 90% of the posters who hate SCJ, 50% think that they run the whole town, while the other 50% does not believe that they do enough. Then of course there is nut case Mr Angry who performs vodoo rituals hoping to bring pain to the Johnson Family.
    The biggest testiment to SCJ was the fact that dispite knowing there owuld be no profit sharing check 90+ percent of the Racine employees went to the "Profit Sharing Celebration" on Dec 23rd. They didn't have to - they could have taken vacation and had another day away from work but instead they went to honor good company and a family.

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  9. Anon 6:40 -

    Why should I gush and compliment SCJ if I've never worked for them? I have yet to see them pay one red cent of ANY bill I've ever paid in my 45 years of existence.

    Please don't reply with some BS like "if they ever left this town, we'd all be in trouble"....Blah, Blah, Blah....That ones been used for decades and is simply hypothetical not to mention the fact that we've lost several large corporations over the years and we're still surviving.

    Please respond SPECIFICALLY with facts and figures as to why I or others not associated with them should be grateful.

    Thank you.

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  10. I think it's hysterical that there is no more profit-sharing. Tee-hee. Welcome to planet earth.

    SCJ EMPLOYEES: INSERT IDIOTIC/SNARKY/ARROGANT REPLIES BELOW

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  11. 7:26 - you don't have to be thankful. Just don't understand the hate.

    7:33 - you've just proved my point - people who enjoy seeing other's hurt. Did you pull the wings off of flies as a child?
    Why that hate?

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  12. Jealous rage maybe? Envy?

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  13. Pete - Guess you'll just have to be satisfied with an occasional invite to Sebastian's.

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  14. 6:40 - You call 17% unemployment surviving . What planet do you live on.

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  15. Amen! Although the Waxies and their six-figure income loot lackeys inhabit a very pleasant place, Racine's rank-and-filers are trapped in a realm of penury, poverty and pounding, pugnacious pain. From what I've heard, the House of Wax and its Ivy League elitists belong to an exclusive mutual admiration society. For the Carnauba Court and its fiscal flunkeys, the rest of Racine's residents are pawns, peons or peasants. The arrogance engendered by excessive wealth and a cult-like corporate culture have combined to transform a clan of cash-cadgers and the retainers thereof into a menace. Company towns and the corruption which they spawn do not happen by accident. Visitors who equate Racine with a corporate version of Stepford are merely honest people who know what they're looking at and call it by its proper name.

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  16. Thanks Michael - I mean Anon 9:59. You are the poster boy for obsessive hate! I am beginning to actually feel sorry for you - you are one pitiful human.

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  17. Psycho 9:59 - do you actually read your crap before you hit the post button? You should because they are making less and less sense. What did that rambing incoherent waste of keystokes have to with anything written previously?

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  18. If you want an example of what Racine would be without SCJ just look at Janesville/Beloit are after GM closed. For those that are tired of hearing the message you best learn from others rather than just being tired of the message.

    It is reality. As SCJ goes Racine goes. It isn't Blah Blah Blah it is our reality.

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  19. This is the Racine post and SCJ employees for the most part don't live in Racine. So maybe the Caledonia, Oak Creek or Mount Pleasant post would be more favorable.
    We are just the lowlifes stuck with all the added manipulation by this corporate family.

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  20. Not to let facts get in the way of your inrational arguement, but 57% of the the Racine based SCJ Employees live in Racine Country and another 20% live in Kenosha County. Are you really so parochial that you consider Racine to be strictly bounded by the city limits?

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  21. 9:59 is Mr. Angry!

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  22. Who the heck is Mr. Angry? In case you don't know it, thousands of capitalism's Racine-area victims hate the system. Anyone who thinks that there's only one irate guy in this terrible town hasn't paid attention to the downtrodden majority of toilers trapped here. The rich are why the rest of us cry. Soon, however, a people's government will teach the oligarchs important lessons in respect for common men.

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  23. President Obama is just the beginning of the end of capitalism. There are other, far more radical leaders waiting to finish the job. The men who'll reform and restructure America will make President Obama look like Newt Gingrich. As for a certain family firm, within twenty years it will be nationalized.

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  24. 4:21 - I guess you missed the election results in Mass. The tide is turning. Obama will be a one term president with a conservative on deck to step in.

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  25. 4:17 - How many times do I have to tell you - you are Mr. Angry 2, there is a Mr. Angry 1, but he's been keeping a pretty low profile lately.

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  26. Ok Michael ie; Mr Angry ie: 9:59, 4:17, 4:21
    Still don't have a job eah?

    You are a real sick puppy - there is no group it's you without a job.
    Give it p you time is over.

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  27. Who's Mr. Angry? I'm afraid there are lots of people here who hate capitalism, the system which brought us the current economic crisis.

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  28. Still waiting for someone to give SPECIFIC details as to why I should be grateful/thankful. I'm still looking at my bills which will be paid for by every single cent of MY hard earned money. If J-Wax wants to pay my gas/electric bill just once, then I'll be grateful. Until then....Go blow.

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  29. You don't have to be greatful - but why the hate?

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  30. Consumer greed brought us to where we are now...not capitalism.

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  31. Not hating at all, I just don't get all the press and gushing they get time after time. I do hate the "if SCJ ever left this city" hypothetical propaganda constantly spewed in these blogs; I will admit that. Where do they sell these crystal balls that everyone can see into the future, I really need one.

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  32. The will of our people will create and reveal the future. One thing I do know for sure--our present form of corporate capitalism is headed for history's landfill. Once the current depression kills belief in the American dream, we'll build a new reality, a planned economic system which will protect all our citizens from the poverty which capitalism inflicts on its victims. My advice to the Waxtrash Corporate Crime Family and its Cornell carpetbaggers is to atop oppressing the poor and start sharing the wealth lest a people's government seize and redistribute the Waxstash. Also, if I knew the Mink Coat Mega-Moolah Matriarch, I'd tell her to teach her grandkids that, for the first time in generations, Waxbrats may have to work for a living.

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  33. 11:16 - same ole, same ole - Hurray for Mass. It's just the begining. Obama the one term wonder!

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  34. History will decide whether or not Obama will be a one-term president. Meanwhile, there are men out there who'll make him resemble Mitt Romney. Coming in twenty years: the nationalization of entire industries, including family companies.

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  35. Dear 11:26 AM, The fourth word in the fifth line of your comment should have been "stop" rather than "atop." Typo aside, I agree with you.

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  36. I read the article in Fortune entitled "No Layoffs Ever" - but how many working at SCJ are temps and can be let go anytime?

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  37. The wicked Waxies don't like to answer such questions because if they were to tell the truth about their company and its labor practices, they'd be unmasked and revealed for what they really are--an arrogant tribe of big buck buccaneers.

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