A real-estate investment trust, a luxury hotel brand, a financial-services firm, a soſtware giant, and an online shoe retailer are among this year’s 100 Best Companies to Work For.

It turns out their meetings are pretty great, too. Here are five reasons why.

By Hunter R. Slaton Illustrations by Chi Birmingham

A

really great place to work has to do a lot of things really well. When Fortune magazine, in

conjunction with the Great Place to Work Institute, polls hundreds of thousands of employees about what life at their company is like — for Fortune’s annual “100 Best Companies to Work For” list — there are questions about camaraderie, management, hiring practices, benefits, and much more. But nothing that directly addresses how these companies plan meetings. We think this is an oversight.

Considering how big a role face-to-face PCMA.ORG

meetings play in the professional lives of employees in almost every industry, we figured that these Best Companies to Work For must have some aces up their sleeves when it comes to getting their people together — for everything from everyday staff meetings to strategic-planning retreats to large- scale sales conferences. And we were right. We spoke to

meeting planners from five different companies on this year’s Fortune list, asking them what’s special about how they meet. Here’s what we learned. ›

JULY 2013 PCMA CONVENE 39