Ideally, however, workers participating in an ESOP receive more than the fruits of their labor in the form of lasting retirement. Employee-owned companies often go above and beyond the day-to-day best practices of non-employee-owned companies to make sure that their employee-owners are respected and engaged, seeing that their contributions are not just heard but acknowledged, that their suggestions aren’t merely seen but incorporated, and that their voices always receive a response. Examples abound of ESOP companies going the extra mile to get their employees involved, and that extra mile often yields advantageous results
not easily replicable at other companies.
As you’ll likely have seen, the business world is at a bit of a crossroads when it comes to both how workers perceive their workplaces and how they are DEI perceived at their workplaces. Right now, there is an enormous push for greater attention to issues of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI). DEI initiatives tend to focus on workers who are often marginalized in the workplace solely by virtue of who they are—be they of a different race, religion, ethnicity, sexual orientation, country of origin, and so on.
It may sound counterintuitive that focusing on differences among people doesn’t lead to atomization but instead greater togetherness. Look closer, though, and the idea makes sense. By learning about the ways in which marginalized workers are often shut out or barred access from even the most basic of workplace opportunities, we can begin to make up for the sometimes significant gap between our intention and our impact. Doing so can lead to teams with greater trust, more willing and able to lean on each other and go beyond the limitations of a more traditional, closed-minded place of business.
Of course, nobody is perfect, and no one company has figured out these issues perfectly; in fact, perfection shouldn’t be the end goal here. But making the effort is more than most are doing and is a large part of struggling in the right direction.