The annual UK Best Companies Awards held and published by The Times come in a number of different categories. The three main categories are the Best 100 Companies, Best 20 Big Companies and Best 100 SMEs.

Each category is evaluated according to specific set of parameters and criteria.

The Best Big Companies award is aim to recognize the top corporations having a workforce size of at least 5,000 people, and each nominee was assessed though five different criteria, namely Leadership Rank (how the employees feel about the top management and leaders), Wellbeing Rank (the stress level, and balance between work and life, Belonging Rank (the feeling of belonging and attachment to the company), Giving Bank Rank (how are the company contributing to the society), and Personal Growth (how well the employees feel they are learning in their company).

While the latest, 2008 award sprung some surprises with inclusion of a number of new and previously low-ranked companies (e.g. Britannia, Sytner, Marriott, Bourne and Mouchel), the top ranked companies featured the usual suspects, which have been dominating the awards for the past years, such as KPMG, PwC, Goldman Sachs, Ernst & Young, Morgan Stanley, O2 and so on.

The winners for the 20 Big Companies award:

1. KPMG

2. Britannia Building Society

3. Goldman Sachs

4. Sytner Group

5. Ernst & Young (E&Y)

6. O2

7. American Express

8. Mott MacDonald

9. Morgan Stanley

10. Royal Bank of Scotland

11. PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC)

12. Deloitte & Touche

13. Atkins

14. Marriott Hotels International

15. Bourne Leisure

16. Mouchel

17. Vodafone

18. Mothercare

19. AXA

20. Deutsche Bank

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