Coca-Cola, Meta rank among top U.S. companies that boost talent: new index

Driving the news: Food and beverage companies Coca-Cola and J.M. Smucker took the top two spots, while W.W. Grainger — an industrial distributor — landed in third.

• Meta, Bank of America and Target also ranked high among the top 100 companies.

Zoom in: The index is a joint project of the Schultz Family Foundation (founded by Starbucks chairman emeritus Howard Schultz and his wife, Sheri), the labor-market research organization Burning Glass Institute and Harvard Business School's Managing the Future of Work Project.

• "At a time when so many are questioning the vitality of the American promise, it's crucial that CEOs and corporate boards look inward and examine how effectively they are nurturing and developing their people," Schultz said.

Between the lines: The consortium says the index, which assesses 400 big companies, is unique because it isn't based on corporate surveys.

• It's a big-data analysis of career trajectories of 5 million workers from 2018 to 2022. It's drawn from changes in their work histories on social media platforms and résumés posted online, and salary and job-posting data.

Go deeper: AI boom leaves companies hard-pressed to find skilled workers