There is nothing magic about employee ownership. Employee ownership does not guarantee success, nor prevent or cure business problems. But it does stand to reason, and experience and research have shown, that employee owners have a different attitude about their company, their job, and their responsibilities that makes them work more effectively, and increases the likelihood that their company will be successful. Fundamentally, employee owners are more accountable for their job performance – and their fellow workers’ job performance – simply because they have a common stake in the success of their company. It’s a simple formula: if employees perform extraordinarily well company performance is more likely to be extraordinary, and that translates into high stock value for the employees. Someone once said, ownership is a powerful incentive for ordinary people to do extraordinary things.

But not everyone is aware of this power. Even some employee owned companies have not realized the full potential of employee ownership. This is not a matter of employees just owning stock but rather employee ownership at work.

Stockholders alone do not build companies – employees build companies and employee owners build great companies.