Oxfam has topped a ranking of the best voluntary and public sector employers to work for, with charities dominating the top 25. 

Recruitment website Indeed has analysed reviews of employers on its website to come up with the ranking. People are asked to score their employer on five areas: management, work-life balance, job security, pay and culture. 

Citizens Advice, British Red Cross and RSPCA were the next highest ranked charities. The highest ranked public sector employer was the Armed Forces, followed by the BBC. 

Last year an anlysis of Glassdoor reviews for large charities, carried out by Civil Society News, found that people working in museums, health charities or  international aid organisations were generally happier than those in the service delivery sector.

Penny Lawrence, deputy chief executive at Oxfam, said: “The research tallies with our own regular surveys which show that the vast majority of staff feel proud to work for Oxfam, enjoy their job and share Oxfam’s vision to end extreme poverty around the world.

"We try to ensure staff have every opportunity to develop their talents in Oxfam and that there are lots of opportunities to learn and engage in our wider work. While salary is important, it's not everything and it's clear to us that delivering job satisfaction is not simply a question of wage, it’s a matter of professional development, engagement and recognition of the value of our wonderful staff and volunteers."

Thirteen charities appeared in the top 25 with scores of between 4 and 4.5 out of 5, according to Indeed’s website. They are: 

1. Oxfam 
2. Citizens Advice 
3. British Red Cross 
4. RSPCA 
5. YMCA 
6. The Salvation Army 
7. Cancer Research UK 
8. PDSA 
9. Age UK 
10. British Heart Foundation 
11. Sue Ryder 
12. Barnardo’s 
13. St John Ambulance 

Indeed is unable share the exact score for each charity in the ranking. A spokesman said: “Indeed uses a proprietary algorithm to rank employers using a variety of factors, such as average rating, number of reviews, and the history of job openings. But in general, employers with a large number of high ratings will place higher in the rankings."

He added: "We weight the rankings by the number of reviews in that country. For example, if one company has 4.0 stars with 50 reviews, and another company has 4.0 stars with 500 reviews, the 500-review company should rank higher. So we mathematically control for the rankings with that."

Charity People & Culture Conference on 20 September 2017 which looks at instilling a positive working culture and putting in place the right strategies, processes and systems to build motivated and effective teams. For more information, and to book, click here.