The overall rankings are determined by the agencies’ Best Places to Work index scores, which measure employee engagement.

The index score is not a combined average of an agency’s category scores. It is calculated using a proprietary weighted formula that looks at responses to three different questions in the U.S. Office of Personnel Management’s Federal Employee Viewpoint Survey. The more the question predicts intent to remain, the higher the weighting.

• I recommend my organization as a good place to work. (Q. 40)
• Considering everything, how satisfied are you with your job? (Q. 69)
• Considering everything, how satisfied are you with your organization? (Q. 71)

We group agencies by workforce size to provide comparisons of agencies that may face similar management challenges in terms of numbers of employees and locations. The groupings have undergone several changes over the years. In 2003 the rankings featured only one list of agencies, including agencies as large as the Department of Defense (over 600,000 employees) and as small as the Office of Management and Budget (450 employees).

Number of Full-time, Permanent Employees by Group

Large

More than 15,000

Midsize

1,000 to 14,999

Small

100 to 999

Subcomponents, the subagencies, bureaus, divisions, centers and offices within agencies need to have at least 100 femployees.

The number of employees was determined by using OPM’s FedScope database. Our criterion was based on the number of permanent employees as of fiscal year 2016, unless otherwise noted.

We have different numbers of agencies participating in the rankings. For example, in 2007, 222 subcomponents participated in the rankings and the median rank was 111. In 2016, 315 subcomponents participated in the rankings and the median rank was 157. We also have made changes to the ranking’s categories. For these reasons, the rank is not the most accurate reflection of an agency’s performance over time. We recommend focusing on score and quartile trends instead.

Several agencies are not represented in the federal employee survey and participate in the rankings voluntarily. These agencies conduct employee surveys comparable to OPM›s federal employee survey and include our three index questions. They may or may not include the questions required for the category scores. These agencies include: the Intelligence Community, Architect of the Capitol, Congressional Budget Office, Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, Government Accountability Office, Government Publishing Office, Peace Corps, Smithsonian Institution, Millennium Challenge Corporation, Office of the Inspector General at the Tennessee Valley Authority and the U.S. Army Audit Agency.