Employee Ownership Blog

In mid-April the NCEO released its most recent estimates of the number of ESOPs and ESOP-equivalent plans.

The Rosen Ownership Opportunities Fund now has nearly $140,000 contributed by over 70 donors.

Broad-based employee ownership appears to be a very common practice in China, especially for divesting government-owned enterprises. But finding useful data or analyses of just how widespread the practice is or how it is structured is very difficult. A recent paper provides some clues.

At a ceremony during the annual employee ownership conference in Denver, three companies received the Innovations in Employee Ownership Award: an engineering and architecture firm, a company that makes after-market automotive products, and a third-party insurance claims administrator.

The Vermont Employee Ownership Conference will be June 10, 2011, at Champlain College in Burlington, Vermont.

While Corey is no longer writing this column, you can see his most recent thinking in his column Observations on Employee Ownership.

Thank you to all the people who have been so warm and supportive of me as I begin my tenure as the NCEO's executive director. I am thrilled and humbled by the opportunity to preserve the quality and integrity you expect from the NCEO, and I am excited to expand that range of what we offer.

On March 29, Congressman Ron Kind (D-WI) introduced the "Promotion and Expansion of Private Employee Ownership Act of 2011." The bill is cosponsored by Reps. David G. Reichert (R-WA), Charles W. Boustany, Jr. (R-LA), Earl Blumenauer (D-OR), Erik Paulsen (R-MN), and Bill Pascrell (D-NJ).

In the past few years, the number of venture-capital backed IPOs has dropped to 50 or fewer, and total IPOs now are about 100 per year, down from about 500 in the 1990s. Many IPOs are not startup companies, but companies that are being spun off from established companies.

Principal Financial sponsors an annual award for the 10 best companies for employee financial security. Companies must have fewer than 1,000 employees.

April 13 marked my last day as executive director of the NCEO and my first as senior staff member.

Over the years, we have talked to many companies that have directed trustees, usually an outside institution. Directed trustees have very limited fiduciary responsibility.