Questions: What are the critical success factors (CSFs) for employee ownership and why are they important? The focus of this research is to identify factors that must receive top priority during a high-stakes implementation. Summary: This research identifies the essential CSFs of employee ownership as discovered in 100 carefully curated articles, cases, and books dedicated … Read More
While equity-based employee incentives can positively affect labour productivity in family firms, our understanding of the effect of nonequity-based employee incentives remains limited. Integrating expectancy theory with the socioemotional wealth preservation literature, our study investigates the impact of cash profit sharing (CPS) on family firms’ labour productivity. Specifically, CPS is viewed as a motivational device … Read More
Correspondingly, in the long-standing literature about EOCs, there seems to be a consensus regarding the rather limited viability of democratic organizational forms. Although the explanations, mainly based on microeconomic models, differ in the causal mechanisms explaining EOCs’ short average lifespan. In this paper, we challenge the conventional wisdom about the reasons for the limited viability … Read More
In the last two decades, scholars have proposed that implementing democratic practices and ideas in organizations results in significant improvements in employees’ attitudes and behavior. Using two widely advocated and debated dimensions of organizational democracy (empowerment and communication), the study provides empirical evidence of the mentioned relationship between organizational democracy and employee outcomes (commitment, citizenship … Read More
The idea of bringing democratization to the workplace has been present in management literature for decades. To further explore this underpinned concept, the present study aims to refine and develop the organizational democracy construct. Using in-depth literature analysis published in the last three decades on organizational democracy, ten dimensions (freedom, fairness, integrity, tolerance, shared responsibility, … Read More
Avery Hall Insurance Agency in Salisbury, Maryland, was founded on principles that included service to customers and communities. The term “Avery Hall Way,” is used to describe the model that Avery Hall used to integrate employee ownership through an Employee Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP) with franchise-like structures to enhance organizational performance. This case study of … Read More
This brief reports on interviews with eleven Black small business owners focusing on their expectations around succession planning, and the impact that awareness of worker cooperatives would have on their decision-making process to sell their business to a worker cooperative when they decide to exit their business. An exit from their business also includes retirement … Read More
The U.S. government captures information in federal surveys, enabling the measurement and study of employee share ownership nationally. The Rutgers Institute for the Study of Employee Ownership and Profit Sharing carefully tracks all of these federal data sets.
This mini-case study describes the Apis & Heritage Legacy Fund I (A&H), a private equity fund from Apis & Heritage Capital Partners LLC, that seeks to tackle the racial wealth gap and improve workplace outcomes by expanding employee ownership. A&H acquires profitable, privately held companies from retiring owners and converts them into 100% employee-owned businesses.
This is a working database of purpose trusts in the United States published in partnership with Common Trust, Broughton Consulting, and Liminal Advisors. It is maintained by the DCII Research Cluster on Employee Ownership and Workplace Democracy (www.eowd.org), with initial funding from the Institute for the Study of Employee Ownership and Profit Sharing at Rutgers … Read More
This course from the Employee Ownership Expansion Network introduces employee ownership.
Summary: Learning basics of ESOPs in five emails over five days. Class 1: ESOP 101 – why do people do this? Class 2: Nuts and bolts – how does it work? Class 3: Tax breaks, valuations, and cost Class 4: ESOPs in practice – the power of employee ownership Class 5: ESOP myths debunked
This course offers a survey of topics that every worker cooperative developer should know. Each chapter has a short video on key ideas, case studies from the field, and tools to use in your own development work.
This course offers a comprehensive understanding of the basics of worker cooperatives while specifically emphasizing communication skills crucial for success within a cooperative workplace structure.
Through this course you will learn how to engage cooperative members in conversations about the business’s financial performance. The Money Story is designed to help cooperative business managers transform every member from confused to informed and empowered through financial storytelling.
In this course you will learn the importance of creating a human-centered personnel practices that will cultivate a democratic work culture and support the success of your business. You will become familiar with performance evaluation and performance improvement planning best practices. This series covers personnel systems, performance evaluation tools, and holding workers accountable.
This book brings together a number of theories under the umbrella of humanistic governance to develop a persuasive alternative perspective on governance, particularly for democratic organizations such as co-operatives. It examines how we can move beyond a profit-first approach to governance, into a framework that prioritizes human dignity in all aspects of an operation. This … Read More
Promoting environmental sustainability may hold relevance for employee-owned organizations. The integration of environmental consciousness into decision-making has the potential to help align environmental and organizational sustainability objectives. However, the literature does not explain how employee-owned organizations make environmentally conscious decisions. This study conducts interviews with top executives of employee-owned organizations to explore how environmentally conscious … Read More
Pete Stavros was on a high after his latest experiment with employee ownership. As the head of industrial investments for KKR, Stavros orchestrated the sale of CHI Overhead Doors, which turned into KKR’s best investment in more than two decades and created $360 million in wealth for CHI’s blue collar workforce through broad-based employee ownership. … Read More
When owners of family-owned and other closely held businesses think about retirement or exit, they weigh several considerations. They often ask themselves and their advisors such questions as: How do I cash out? How do I best handle succession, estate, and tax issues? What will happen to the business that my family members or partners, … Read More
This short brief provides updated statistics and analysis regarding workers’ participation in employee ownership plans, and the wealth and job quality benefits those workers realize from their participation. The brief was presented as part of the 2023 Employee Ownership Ideas Forum cosponsored by Aspen Institute and the Institute for the Study of Employee Ownership and … Read More
Questions: Why are so few Employee Stock Ownership Plans (ESOPs) created? Why do business owners who proactively explore an ESOP sale but decide not to proceed make that choice? What do such sellers see as the key barriers? What information informs their decision? What are their primary transaction objectives? What alternatives do they opt to … Read More
Question: How satisfied are employees with their pay in ESOP firms, and what are the possible solutions to employees’ low pay satisfaction? Answer: In this group of nine ESOP firms, some employees report that they are paid an above-average wage, but some report they are paid a below-average wage. Those with a below-average wage are … Read More
Questions: What impact do ESOPs have on wealth in retirement? In particular, what is the relationship between prior ESOP participation and the average wealth of worker-owners once they retire? And what effect (if any) do ESOPs have on wealth inequality among retirees? Summary: Using data from the 2008-2018 waves of the Health and Retirement Study, … Read More
Questions: How do women fare in ESOPs? How do women in ESOPs compare to women not in ESOPs? Summary: Some gender differences in the larger society are reflected in ESOP companies. There are fewer women than men in ESOPs. Within ESOPs there are fewer women in top management and highly trained/high pay occupations. Women in … Read More