Recently, CareerBliss noted that while Google remains in its Top 50 Best Companies to Work For, the company is slipping from its high ranking. Google is reported as having trouble holding onto talent, losing people to Facebook and other startups.

Fortunately, two years ago Google implemented Project Oxygen, an effort by in-house statisticians to analyze why people leave Google.

People typically leave a company for one of three reasons, or a combination of them. The first is that they don’t feel a connection to the mission of the company, or sense that their work matters. The second is that they don’t really like or respect their co-workers. The third is they have a terrible boss — and this was the biggest variable.

Google’s Project Oxygen found that what employees valued above all were connected, caring managers. Employee feedback highlighted

• “even-keeled bosses who made time for one-on-one meetings
• “helping people puzzle through problems by asking questions, not dictating answers”
• “took an interest in employees’ lives and careers”
• “making that connection and being accessible”

The head of the Corporate Leadership Council says that “Google is at the leading edge” of companies attempting to apply a data-driven approach to the unpredictable world of human interactions.

When Google realized that managers have a much greater impact on employees’ performance and how they felt about their job than any other factor, they set to work analyzing what makes a great boss. Not just anywhere, but at Google in particular. Project Oxygen began to examine the habits of highly successful managers.

Once Google had its list, the company started teaching it in training programs, as well as in coaching and performance review sessions with individual employees. It paid off quickly: they saw a significant improvement in manager quality for 75 percent of the worst-performing bosses.

Online forums for Google employees commend the company as being a “culture of continuous improvement, at breakneck speed.” Fostering a democratic environment, where all voices carry equal weight, will go far in retaining quality employees over the long haul at Google.

In December of 2011, Seventh Generation announced its partnership with the nation’s first K-5 school with a sustainability theme.

The Sustainability Academy at Lawrence Barnes Elementary School in Burlington, VT is an international model for using sustainability as a lens for education.

Besides providing non-toxic cleaning products for classrooms and teachers, Seventh Generation has participated in a literacy-building program for the school, and helped fund a brand-new alternative energy system designed to reduce the school’s carbon footprint while serving as an educational tool for students.

Plans for 2012 include a science ambassador program in which Seventh Generation employees will work with students to understand the connection between personal and environmental health, along with 880 hours of employee volunteer time to build an outdoor classroom and a natural playground for the school.