United is a Poor Model for Employee Ownership
It would be easy to look at what’s happening at United Airlines, now on the brink of bankruptcy, and conclude that the concept of employee ownership in America has fallen into a tailspin.
Compensation at Level 3 Communications
Level 3’s unique compensation plan rewarded managers for the firm’s performance only if the firm’s stock price movement exceeded that of the market. This design was intended to maximize shareholder value by tying managers’ performance more closely to that of the firm.
Incentive Compensation and Employee Ownership
This book takes a broad look at how to use incentives, ranging from stock options to cash bonuses to gainsharing, to motivate and reward employees in dynamic companies that seek to create a more productive ‘ownership’ culture.
Research Evidence on Prevalence and Effects of Employee Ownership
The idea of employee ownership has attracted support across the political spectrum, often being seen as a form of economic democracy that complements our political democracy. Along with these positive views, however, there have been many concerns expressed about employee ownership particularly that it can expose workers to excessive risk and may in some cases increase labor management conflict and lower economic performance.
Starbucks Coffee Company
This case traces the origins of Starbucks and its rapid growth through joint partnerships and diversified products, and its rapid expansion of retail cafes. A profile of Starbuck’s financial contributions to community development and literacy projects, and its efforts to promote progressive workplace conditions is presented. Despite this, criticisms of pushing out local businesses, homogenization … Read More
Broad-Based Employee Stock Options – A Union-Nonunion Comparison
Until recently, stock options were primarily reserved for senior executives and selected managers in most American corporations. In the last decade or so, however, stock options have become part of the compensation package for an increasing number of rank-and-file employees.
Southwest Airlines Corporation
Southwest Airlines, consistently ranked as one of the top performing airlines in the business, began a profit-sharing plan in 1974.
Company Stock in Pension Plans: How Costly is it?
The high-profile collapse of Enron has focused attention on just how much employees stand to lose when they invest retirement savings in company stock.
Shared Modes of Compensation and Firm Performance: UK Evidence
This paper examines the use and consequences of shared compensation plans (profit sharing, profit related pay, SAYE schemes and company stock option plans) in a sample of UK workplaces and firms in the 1990s.
Sharing Ownership via Employee Stock Ownership
This paper summarizes the findings from over 50 large-sample empirical studies that have been done on employee ownership and broad-based stock option plans in the past 25 years, covering studies on plan adoption, employee attitudes and behaviours, firm performance, and employee wages and wealth.
Managing for Value: It’s Not Just about the Numbers (HBR OnPoint Enhanced Edition)
The authors argue that properly applied, a VBM program will put your company’s profitability firmly on track.
Nucor Corporation (A, B)
This case examines several strategies advocated by various actors in the Nucor Corporation, a major producer of steel.
Note on Employee Stock Ownership Plans (ESOPs) and Phantom Stock Plans
Provides a brief overview of employee stock ownership plans (ESOPs) and phantom stock plans for owners of closely held companies.
New Economy Ethics: YouKnowIt.com
The case suggests ways of compensating the advisory board and raises questions about whether there are new rules in the new economy about building professional networks, and when offers of equity constitute bribery and wrong doing.
Microsoft’s Vega Project: Developing People and Products
This case describes Microsoft’s human resource philosophies and policies and illustrates how they work in practice to provide the company with a major source of competitive advantage. Discusses employee development, motivation, and retention efforts in one of Microsoft’s product groups.
United Airlines
In 1994 United Airlines became the largest employee majority-owned enterprise in the United States, with various groups of employees – most represented by unions – having purchased 55% of its stock in exchange for various concessions. The employees accepted pay cuts and made other concessions, but were also granted representation on the company’s board of directors…[newline]
Employee Ownership and Unions: Lessons from the Airline Industry
The U.S. airline industry has, in recent years, offered some conspicuous examples of a phenomenon that has now become familiar, both in the U.S. and abroad, among firms that face economic difficulties: the granting to employees of a substantial ownership stake in return for wage and work rule concessions necessary to maintain the firm’s viability.
Sealed Air Corp.’s Leveraged Recapitalization (A, B)
Less than a year after Sealed Air embarked on a program to improve manufacturing efficiency and product quality, the company borrowed almost 90% of the market value of its common stock and paid it out as a special dividend to shareholders.
Howard Schultz (A, B)
In the late 1980s Howard Schultz led the Starbucks Coffee Co. to explosive growth, transforming a small whole-bean coffee company into a national retail power. Starbucks success hinged on its reputation for quality and personal service…
Empowerment or Else
Nine years ago, the author bought a small manufacturing company with marginal profits, poor union relations, nit-picking work rules, and high labor costs. After a year of bickering, Frey decided he wanted to implement profit sharing.
The Economic Effects of Profit Sharing in Great Britain
There are a number of ways to have workers’ remuneration linked more readily with firms’ commercial performance. One is to link wages to profits by using cash-based profit sharing (where workers are made cash payments which vary with employer’s profitability). A second is to have workers paid partly in their firms’ own shares. A third, and more extreme alternative, is producer co-operatives where workers participate in profits, ownership and decision-making. In this article we examine both the theoretical and empirical evidence in support of such schemes.
Global Equity Organization
The Global Equity Organization (GEO) provides a forum for an open exchange between members, regardless of position or affiliation, of the latest information as to the strategic, financial, cultural, legal, tax, communication and administrative issues involving the use of equity-based employee compensation in the global community.
Video Collection Homepage
This Video Collection presented by the Foundation for Enterprise Development with the Employee Ownership Foundation and Aspen Institute contains videos from well-respected professors, students and business owners who speak about ways to use employee ownership as a resourceful business tool. They discuss the culture, participation and practices of employee ownership, as well as the facts and statistics of ESOP companies in the world today.
How Well Is Employee Ownership Working?
With ESOPs performing so well more American managers should consider adopting this approach.
Employee Perspectives on Stock Ownership: Financial Investment or Mechanism of Control?
This paper explores employee ownership as a financial investment rather than a mechanism of control. Viewed from such a perspective, relations among employee ownership, satisfaction, and desired influence are more complex than supposed.