Ownership Culture: Preparing for Employee Ownership Month

If you read last month’s newsletter article about Driving Engagement in Ways Big and Small, you may already be thinking about Employee Ownership Month (EOM). This month, I wanted to take a deeper dive into EOM, which is celebrated every October—a tradition going back decades (you can learn more about the history of EO Month here).

EOM can be celebrated in many different ways and at different scales. Some companies will plan for one touchpoint during the month, while others will have weekly to daily touchpoints—both of which are equally valuable. There are no hard-and-fast rules here. That said, I often think of four pillars when it comes to EOM: communication, education, engagement, and celebration.

Communication

Start with the “why”—why employee ownership and why EOM. This is a great opportunity to revisit how employee ownership came to be and why it matters. One exercise we often encourage companies to do is to have a discussion of what it would mean if the company were sold to another buyer, or worse, simply closed because there was no buyer. This conversation can help ground people in one of the many reasons that being an employee-owned company matters—such as maintaining independence and jobs.

Next is deciding what you’ll communicate and how you’ll go about doing so, meaning how you’ll announce EOM internally. Some companies opt to send out emails at the beginning of the month announcing that it’s Employee Ownership Month and using that as an opportunity to also recognize the efforts of all employee-owners in the culture and success of the business.

EOM is also a prime opportunity to shout from the rooftops (or other relevant channels) that you are employee-owned, sharing what that means for your community and local economy and for your customers, clients, suppliers, and partners. Can you take that a step further and use the information to garner attention from local media channels? Some companies use press releases, while others use social media as a way to make bold statements. Whichever path you choose, we encourage companies to consider sharing the message of employee ownership and EOM across their channels, as this drives awareness for both your company and the broader community.

Education

Planning education opportunities can help to make the most of the month by increasing employee-owner understanding of the ESOP or other employee ownership model. Many members opt to plan a weekly educational focus. For example, you may start the month by offering ESOP 101 training. From here, you can take employees through the ins and outs of eligibility and vesting. Lastly, you can talk about how valuation works at a high level. Some concepts can be covered through shared resources, such as from the Download, and emailed out and/or posted on internal intranet sites. These topics could also be set up as brown bag learning lunches or small group meetings. Regardless of how you go about sharing the information, it is important to leave space for folks to seek clarification and ask questions.

Other ways to incorporate education into the month’s planning are through text messages, shared screens, news-letters, team huddles, and company-wide meetings.

Engagement

Another area to consider is creating engagement and community throughout the month. As with other examples shared here, this can be accomplished in many different ways. Scheduling coffee socials, potluck lunches, or happy hours can be a nice way to give employees a break during the day and a chance to connect with people they may not see on a regular basis. Aside from the potluck, these can also be done via Zoom, though it can require a little more effort to get people to engage virtually (rotating breakout rooms can be really helpful here).

Offering games and activities throughout the month also enhances overall engagement. Games like scavenger hunts (see this example from KTA) can be a nice way to get people excited about the ESOP while also including some elements of ESOP education, like having to find someone who is fully vested and answer when the company became employee-owned. Other examples are EO trivia (answer key), Jeopardy, crossword puzzles, and word searches.

The last area of engagement revolves around ownership culture. One approach, if you have an ownership rights and responsibilities statement or are looking to implement one, is to have a discussion as a team or with direct reports on what these look like on a day-to-day basis at the individual contributor and departmental level.

Celebration

I can’t talk about EOM without bringing up celebrations—especially when there are so many things to celebrate. First is your employee-owners and their continual contributions to the company. This is also a great opportunity to celebrate more recent hires, those that have entered into the plan during the current year, and those who have hit vesting milestones. A favorite tradition at many companies is the vesting ceremony itself, in which fully vested employee-owners are often presented with a physical vest, an engraved coin, or other symbol.

Another area of celebration can be significant company milestones and achievements from the prior year—new products, markets, customers, etc.

And of course, you can’t go wrong with bringing people together and having a party.

Next Steps

If you are looking for more inspiration and ideas on what to do this Employee Ownership Month, be sure to check out our newly updated EO Month Toolkit. Please note, this is a members-only resource, and you will need to be logged in to your NCEO account to access the content. You can also join us on September 12 at 11:30 a.m. CT for our Community Conversation: Celebrating Employee Ownership Month.