DaVita Named Among Five Most Likeable Companies of 2012

DENVER—DaVita was recognized this week as one of the top five most likeable companies in the U.S. by New York Times bestselling author Dave Kerpen, whose latest book is Likeable Business.

Rounding out the top five most likeable businesses according to Kerpen were The Company Store, Entenmann’s, Southwest Airlines, and Trader Joe’s.

Likeable Business describes a variety of traits that make businesses “likeable” —qualities that help them deliver more of what modern consumers demand. Kerpen says the traits of a likeable business include gratefulness, team playing, responsiveness, passion and surprise and delight.

“DaVita is the nation's second largest dialysis provider and holds ‘team playing’ as a core value,” according to a news release from Likeable Media, where Kerpen serves as CEO. “The DaVita Village, home to 45,000 team members, is a community first, and a company second.”

Likeable Business chronicles DaVita’s dramatic turnaround from company on the brink of bankruptcy in 1999 to a thriving business with more than $7B in revenues in 2011. Much of DaVita’s success can be attributed to the team assembled and nurtured by DaVita Chairman and CEO Kent Thiry.

Living out DaVita’s “team” value included the creation of the DaVita Village Network (DVN), a program Thiry proposed early in the company’s turnaround period. The DVN provides DaVita teammates with financial assistance during times of crisis and has supplied more than $2 million to hundreds of teammates since its creation.

“The DaVita team is a family – all 45,000 of them,” Kerpen writes in the book. “They care for each other with intensity, learn from each other, and work hard to live their shared values for each other and their patients.”

DaVita and DaVita HealthCare Partners are trademarks or registered trademarks of DaVita Healthcare Partners Inc. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.