By prescription: Glaxo Wellcome has all the right ingredients to be the best place to work in North Carolina.

• Position: Cover Story

There's a secret formula at Glaxo Wellcome Inc., and it's not for the drug that will cure cancer. It's not evident from the tree-lined campus landscape, punctuated with building upon clean, white angular building on Moore Drive in the heart of Research Triangle Park. Chemists aren't studying it in the company's countless laboratories, birthplaces of AZT and Zantac. Nor, when you get right down to it, is it saving any lives. But at a time when jobs are plentiful and good people to fill them are scarce, Glaxo's human-resource strategy is a simple but necessary equation.

It's a mix of benefits and perks, blended to create the perfect elixir. Some Tar Heel companies offer better retirement programs, some have better health plans, many have livelier atmospheres. But across-the-board, none rates as high as Glaxo when it comes to how it treats employees. From a training program that allows workers to tailor their own curriculum to health benefits that are 88% company-paid (and extended to same-sex partners), Glaxo came up solid in every category BUSINESS NORTH CAROLINA studied in its hunt for the best company to work for.

"I'd like to say we do these things because we're nice people," says Steve Sons, vice president of organizational effectiveness. But the efforts of the 200-strong human-resource department benefit the company as much as its workers. "A happy employee equals lots of productivity," says Beverly Morgan, director of employee relations. "That's a win-win."

There's another, harder-to-measure element - one no human-resources wizard can concoct - that factors into making Glaxo a great place to work. It's what one employee describes as being part of "a fairly noble mission - making sick people better." Drug companies are out to make a buck, but that doesn't mean employees can't relish a sense of higher purpose.

Other benefits are more tangible: a 25,000-square-foot subsidized child-care center, five workout facilities, 10 cafeterias and five health clinics. More on-site conveniences are on tap for 1999: a dry-cleaning drop-off, a postal station, an oil-change service, even take-home hot meals from the cafeterias. "Everything that can make your life a little easier, they've thought about it," says Sherry Turner, payroll-processing manager. "Or if they haven't thought about it, they're thinking about it."

They have to. With unemployment in North Carolina and the nation so low, Glaxo has to offer more than other drug companies vying for the same workers. "A lot of people who work here, they could be somewhere else," Morgan says. The company reviews its benefits each year to see how they compare with competitors'. Elaine Davis, director of human-resource services, points to the 401(k) plan. Employees get a 100% company match on a contribution of up to 6%. "That's absolutely the best in the industry."

Glaxo's RTP campus is a community of its own. You can drop off your child at day care, work out...