Twenty-seven northeastern Wisconsin businesses across a range of industries earned recognition this week as employers of choice by those who know them best: their employees.
The Northeast Wisconsin Top Workplaces 2026 program highlighted small, medium and large companies whose employees’ survey responses singled them out for recognition.
Representatives from the selected companies convened on July 15 at Gather on Broadway in Green Bay to celebrate an honor they said stands out from most other workplace awards because it is based entirely on employee feedback.
“The piece that’s the most honoring, that we’re so excited about is this comes directly from feedback from our staff about how they feel when they show up to work each day,” said Mike Slowinski, superintendent of the Kaukauna Area School District, a two-time Top Workplaces honoree. “To have a recognition like Top Workplaces validates that when people come to work at the Kaukauna Area School District, they’re having a good experience and feel the work they’re doing is meaningful and fulfilling.”
Top Workplaces also presented 15 specialty awards to the companies during the July 15 event. The awards included three Leadership Awards to Capital Credit Union CEO Laurie Butz, Slowinski and Acre Realty owner Mike Karisny.
Northeast Wisconsin Top Workplaces celebrates region’s ‘people-first’ employers
Energage and USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin launched Northeast Wisconsin Top Workplaces in 2024. In its third year now, companies continue to struggle to find and retain skilled workers and a Top Workplaces designation can help a business stand out with job applicants and give companies a point of pride.
“Earning a Top Workplaces award is a celebration of excellence,” said Eric Rubino, CEO of Energage. “It serves as a reminder of the vital role a people-first workplace experience plays in achieving success.”
Kaukuana Area School District’s intentional focus on well-being, ‘connecting the dots’ for employees produces results for staff, students
Wisconsin in general continues to grapple with elevated turnover rates for teachers, principals and superintendents, according to an October 2025 Wisconsin Policy Forum report.
But the Kaukauna Area School District has found a way to buck that trend and become an employer of choice in northeastern Wisconsin. The district earned its second consecutive Top Workplaces recognition in 2026 as it continues to focus on improving employee engagement and well-being, Slowinski said.
Slowinski said the district’s leadership in 2023 prioritized alignment and staff engagement. He said staff input showed people didn’t always connect their job and contributions to the district’s vision and strategic goals.
The district formed a well-being committee to solicit feedback from staff on how to mitigate stress and improve the workplace culture. It also made changes to its salary structure and paid time off. And it has constantly focused on engagement to ensure employees, no matter their role, can see the connection between their feedback and changes the district makes. Committee input led the district to expand access to role-specific professional learning opportunities and strengthened on-boarding processes for specific roles, Slowinski said.
The district has seen several positive results already.
Staff’s voluntary turnover among non-retirees dropped from about 20% in the early 2020s to 5% in each of the last three years. And job openings in the district now draw a higher number of more-qualified applicants as people see and hear what’s happening in the district.
The increased engagement and staff’s understanding of how they contribute to the district’s continuous improvement has also shown up in student outcomes, too.
Slowinski said that in the 2025-26 school year, Kaukauna had 90% of students considered regular attenders, the highest percentage since the district started tracking it. Student test results in math and literacy show high levels of growth, too. Students are getting involved with activities outside of classes.
“We can tie [those] directly to staff who are highly engaged, consistency from lower turnover, and staff understanding the vision,” Slowinski said. “That definitely has a really positive impact on the students and families we serve.”
How employee surveys determined the 2026 Northeast Wisconsin Top Workplaces
Energage, in partnership with USA TODAY NETWORK-Wisconsin media outlets in the region, invited 1,240 organizations (up from 951 in 2025) with more than 35 employees located in an 18-county area to participate in Top Workplaces 2026.
The eligible counties are Brown, Calumet, Door, Florence, Fond du Lac, Green Lake, Kewaunee, Manitowoc, Marquette, Marinette, Menominee, Oconto, Outagamie, Sheboygan, Shawano, Waupaca, Waushara and Winnebago.
No cost was required to participate or requirement for honorees to purchase a product or service.
Energage received permission from 32 companies to survey their employees on 26 different workplace factors like benefits, direction, leadership and appreciation. It used aggregated employee feedback to score each business and those whose score is higher than national benchmarks earn the Top Workplaces designation.
The 27 businesses that earned recognition as Northeast Wisconsin Top Workplaces represents a 28.5% increase in honorees from 2025.
What companies are the Northeast Wisconsin Top Workplaces for 2025?
For a more detailed look at each honoree, watch for expanded coverage in the July 20 print editions of northeastern Wisconsin USA TODAY NETWORK newspapers.
Companies with an asterisk after their names have earned Top Workplaces recognition each year since the program started in 2024.
Large, 500+ employees
Midsize, 150-499 employees
Small, less than 150 employees
Special awards recognize companies that excel in areas like leadership, benefits and work-life flexibility
Energage also presented 15 special awards to this year’s 24 Northeast Wisconsin Top Workplaces honorees in areas like leadership, management, direction, communication, work-life flexibility, training and sustainability.
The recipients were chosen based on employees’ responses to specific questions in the survey. For example, responses to “I have confidence in the leader of this company” was used to identify the small, midsize and large Leadership Award recipients mentioned earlier.
The 2026 special award winners are:
My workplace is pretty rad. How can it qualify for Top Workplaces 2027?
The more than 1,240 companies invited to participate in 2026 represents a fraction of the workplaces across the 18-county northeastern Wisconsin region.
If you didn’t see your company on this year’s list, there’s a couple of possibilities why: It might not have met the criteria to participate, leadership may have opted not to participate or maybe the employee feedback scores were not strong enough.
But don’t worry, there is always Top Workplaces 2027. If you want more information on how to nominate a company, visit topworkplaces.com/northeastwis.
Contact business reporter Jeff Bollier at (920) 431-8387 or jbollier@usatodayco.com. Follow him on X at @JeffBollier.
This article originally appeared on Appleton Post-Crescent: Credit unions, car dealers among 2026 Northeast Wisconsin Top Workplaces
Reporting by Jeff Bollier, Green Bay Press-Gazette / Appleton Post-Crescent
USA TODAY Network via Reuters Connect
By Jeff Bollier, Green Bay Press-Gazette | USA TODAY Network
