Sustaining Employee Ownership for the Long Term: The Challenge of the Mature ESOP Company
What do veteran ESOP companies have much to teach us about what it takes to sustain employee ownership over the long term?
KCI Technologies, Inc.: Engineering the Future, One Employee at a Time
KCI, a multi-disciplined engineering firm, has undergone a number of transformations over the last several decades. It started as a basement dream, was acquired and sold-off by a larger firm, and has emerged as a multi-million dollar employee-owned organization.
Namaste Solar
Should a fast-growing, employee-owned solar electric company accept a buyout offer from a private equity investor? Could it do so without sacrificing its distinctive, high-involvement culture? Namaste Solar, a 55-person firm based in Boulder, Colorado, designed and installed solar electric systems for residential, commercial, non-profit and government customers. In 2008, the company had been growing … Read More
Equity on Demand: The Netflix Approach to Compensation
Netflix was among a small group of Silicon Valley companies to emerge from the technology bubble of the late 1990s a clear winner in terms of growth, market share, and profitability. That Netflix was able not only to prevail over this competition but also to thrive was largely attributable to the culture of freedom and … Read More
Employee Ownership: A Topic for the Entrepreneurship Curriculum
This Teaching module shows four areas in the entrepreneurship curriculum where teaching about employee ownership can 1) put a needed spotlight on this widespread and useful practice and 2) add conceptual value and rich examples for the course topics being taught…
When Workers Take Charge
It’s a unique model – the worker-owned business. Some say it sounds like socialism, but these six companies say it’s helped them tough out the recession.
Incentives, Targeting and Firm Performance: An Analysis of Non-Executive Stock Options
We examine whether options granted to non-executive employees affect the performance of the firm by exploring the link between broad-based option plans, option portfolio implied incentives, and firm operating performance.
Employee Share Ownership Plans: A Review
This paper reviews the main strands of research on employee share ownership over the last forty years.
Psychological Ownership: Theoretical Extensions, Measurement and Relation to Work Outcomes
First, the authors developed a scale for psychological ownership with four components — self-efficacy, accountability, sense of belongingness, and self-identity. Second, they correlated it with transformational leadership, organizational citizenship behavior, organizational commitment, workplace deviance, intentions to stay, and job satisfaction. All the correlations were in the predicted direction. The authors concluded that integrating psychological ownership … Read More
A Closer Look at Business Education: Employee Ownership
This Closer Look scans the current landscape of employee ownership teaching in graduate business programs, and shares the perspectives of a leading academic and veteran practitioner about the salient lessons of this model of business.
The Carris Companies: Doing the Next Right Thing
Presented in this case is the Carris Companies’ movement towards 100% employee shared ownership and governance with an emphasis on and investment in education; focus on ‘quality of life’; economic, educational and social accessibility provided by the company for its employees, many of whom are unskilled at the time of initial employment; encouragement of employee wellness; employee involvement in corporate decision-making and philanthropy; companies’ increased efforts to reduce waste and energy use and the overall positive effects on the companies’ profitability…
A Positive Movement Forward: Carris Companies Employee-Governance
This chapter presents William (Bill) H. Carris’s distinctive organizational design for a positive and practical model of 100% employee-governance in the movement toward 100% employee-ownership of the Carris Companies, a manufacturer of wood, plastic, and metal reels in six United States locations and one in Mexico…
King Arthur Flour
Steve Voigt, the CEO of King Arthur Flour, must determine how the company can continue to grow, whilst preserving its unique culture. In 1996, the company was sold to employees in as ESOP transaction. The following decade saw significant growth, despite declining sales for the industry as a whole. The success could be attributed both … Read More
Employee Share Ownership Schemes: Two Case Studies
This study seeks to open up an examination of the reasons for implementing an ESO scheme at the enterprise level in Australia, through two interview-based case studies conducted at National Australia Bank Ltd and Palm Springs Ltd.
The Ultimate Employee Buy-in
Sell the company to your employees? It’s a great idea–both for you and for the business you’re leaving behind.
Conscious Growth: Why South Mountain Co. Pursues Deliberate Rather Than Maximum Growth
Is it true that small businesses are just big businesses that haven’t succeeded yet? John Abrams’ company pursues conscious growth not maximum growth.
Employee Governance and the Ownership of the Firm
By law, shareholders have an exclusive right to make certain corporate decisions, and this arrangement is generally justified by the shareholder’s role as the owner of the firm. However, many thoughtful observers hold that such a privileged position for shareholders is morally objectionable, in part because it neglects the important role played by employees.
The United Airline Bankruptcy and the Future of Employee Ownership
UAL suffered from particular design flaws in its stock ownership plan and, more seriously, the absence of complementary institutions focused on the distinctive problems of employee-owned firms.
Governing the Firm: Workers’ Control in Theory and Practice
Many explanations for the rarity of workers’ control have been offered, but there have been few attempts to assess these hypotheses in a systematic way. This book draws upon economic theory, statistical evidence, and case studies to frame an explanation.
The Strategic Use of Individual Employment Agreements: Three Case Studies
In light of varying outlooks on the process of individualisation in the hitherto collectively regulated industries, it was thought worthwhile revisiting the three disputes (those involving CRA Weipa, BHP, and the Commonwealth Bank) and thoroughly documenting them with a view to discovering what light they shed on the objectives of the individualisation process.
Working Toward Transparency and Accountability: Carris Companies Governance
This conceptual paper based on a case examines some of the devastating impacts of the recent spate of corporate wrongdoing, noting the widespread interconnectivity and interrelationships these demonstrate; revisits the roots of capitalism and the underpinnings of corporate citizenship; and explores the efforts of the Carris Companies as they implemented their plan for 100% employee ownership and governance, working toward full transparency and accountability in their decision-making.
Carris Companies’ Practice of Employee Governance
Distinguishing the Carris Companies’ transition to 100% employee ownership was its more unusual movement towards 100% employee governance. This paper examines the Carris Companies’ practice of governance and the process used to prepare stakeholder citizens for their changing roles and relationships.
Worker Participation: Lessons from the Workers Co-Ops of the Pacific Northwest
The purpose of this book is to consider some consequences of worker participation in production and to provide an accessible economics perspective on two groups of worker co-ops in the Pacific Northwest: the plywood co-ops and the forestry worker co-ops.
The Carris Companies: Making 100% Employee Governance the Practice—Shifting Stakeholder and Citizen Rights and Responsibilities to the Employees
Following a brief description of the methodology employed within this chapter, background information is provided on the Carris Companies. Changing stakeholder relationships highlighted in the segment on employee ownership provide a foundation for understanding the transitional process within the Carris Companies and, specifically, the practice of governance.
Sportasia LTD.: A Community Company
Evident in the case are important themes such as the transformational leadership of its senior management, the effective use of human resource strategies to control organisational growth, and the adoption of values similar to Charles Handy’s ‘Citizen Corporation’.