Work, Happiness and Employee Ownership

Synopsis

The financial success of organisations now relies on the whole-hearted participation and extra effort – in other words on the “engagement” - of employees. Labour productivity, economically speaking, is where the action is. Successful enterprises are ones in which employees are active “co-creators” of value, rather than passive followers. Clear leadership, decent management and humane policies can all help. But it is necessarily an uphill struggle to convince people to go “the extra mile” for the firm, when the additional money thereby generated flows into other hands. As Marx (Groucho, not Karl) put it: “What makes wage slaves? Wages!” There is a mechanism by which the real quality of working life and the productivity of organisations can be lifted: giving employees a real financial stake in their firm and the opportunity to add value. People who are co-owners of an enterprise are inescapably invested in its success or failure.

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