Credit: Walt Disney CompanyFortune released its list of the “World’s Most Admired Companies” for 2020. It ranked The Walt Disney Company as number 4 overall for the second consecutive year, as well as the number one spot in the entertainment industry.
Let’s break this down:
Fortune Ranks The Walt Disney Company 4th Overall for the Second Consecutive Year
Disney ranked behind only Apple, Amazon, and Microsoft (in that order). Those behind Disney in the Top-10 overall included the U.S.-based multinational conglomerate holding company, Berkshire Hathaway; Starbucks; Google’s parent company, Alphabet; JPMorgan Chase; Costco Wholesale; and Salesforce.
The Walt Disney Company earned the top rank of entertainment industry companies
Disney was named best-regarded in the entertainment industry, and it was the only entertainment-industry company to rank in Fortune’s Top-10 overall. Netflix was named second-best in the industry, but 14th overall. Third-ranked in the industry, Electronic Arts, was ranked 132 overall.
Related: “It was all started by a mouse” – But how big is The Walt Disney Company?
“How did Fortune rank these companies?”
Fortune partnered with the management consulting firm, Korn Ferry, to determine the best-regarded companies worldwide in 52 industries. Here’s how they did it:
- They started with ~1,500 candidate companies
- The 1,000 largest U.S. companies (ranked by revenue)
- Non-U.S. companies in Fortune’s Global 500 database with a revenue of $10 billion or more.
- They then narrowed down the list to the top-revenue companies in each industry.
- List reduced to 680 companies representing 30 different countries.
- Rank was determined by tallied votes made by executives who work in those 680 companies.
To determine the best-regarded companies in each of the 52 industries, executives, directors, and analysists ranked companies within their own respected industries based on nine criteria.
- Those criteria include:
- Investment value
- Quality of Management
- Quality of Products
- Ability to Attract Talent
- Social Responsibility
To select the Top 50 Overall, 3,770 executives, directors, and security analysts completed a survey where they named the ten companies they admired most from a list of options.
- Their options included:
- Companies that ranked in the top 25% overall of 2019’s survey.
- Companies that ranked in the top 20% of their industry. (Not guaranteed to be in the top 25% overall)
- Anyone taking the survey can vote for any company in any industry.
Rank Beyond Fortune
The Walt Disney Company also earned a high ranking in similar lists last year.
In a press release, the company stated:
In 2019, The Walt Disney Company ranked high (No. 5) on The Axios Harris Poll 100, which measures the reputations of the 100 most visible companies in the U.S. and determines how people perceive these prominent businesses; and on Reputation Institute’s Global RepTrak® 100 (No. 3), which surveys 230,000 individuals in 15 countries to study public perception toward the top companies around the globe and determine which are believed to be the world’s most reputable.
We are excited to see how Disney meets and surpasses its reputation as move further into 2020.