US manufacturing is struggling with both a productivity and job quality challenge. These challenges are interconnected, reinforcing the need for increased coordination of economic and workforce development efforts. This article outlines the evaluation findings of a novel business-facing initiative called the Genesis Movement, to understand its role in reshaping the workforce experience within small- and medium-sized manufacturing businesses in Chicago, Illinois. Spearheaded in 2014 by the Illinois Manufacturing Excellence Center (IMEC), Genesis starts with the premise that workforce practices are central to business operations, productivity, and competitiveness—and therefore, manufacturing extension services need to promote improvements to job quality in support of long-term business success. This integrated approach represents a form of “inclusive innovation,” expanding the capacities of firms and workers to adapt in a competitive environment where pressures to maintain high quality while reducing costs are ever-present. Firms that participate in Genesis learn to adopt an inclusive organizational culture, using front-line worker engagement, skills training, and job quality improvements to drive performance and process innovation. As such, Genesis offers transferable lessons that could be leveraged by other manufacturing-supporting organizations to benefit their industry clients and the workers they employ.
The emergence of distressed urban areas in the 1990s was unexpected. Governments have reacted with a series of policy initiatives which have increasingly focused on area-based strategies, partnerships and the formulation of a metropolitan vision. The scale of the problem-up to 20 per cent of the total population may live in distressed urban areas—and the complexity of causes are two factors which have complicated the design and implementation of policy. Better indicators are needed, especially to check the tendency towards a rhetoric of polarisation which makes the problems appear impossible to solve. A recent OECD study and a study of partnerships undertaken by the European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions (EFILWC) call attention to the importance of local participation and of business and labour in local strategies for regeneration. To compare experiences and analyses their policy implications, the OECD and the EFILWC organised a conference in Dublin in 1998, of which this paper is an analytical report. One of the findings of the conference deserving further study concerns the role of the media in shaping public opinion on regeneration issues; another concerns the need for preventive strategies and policies; and a third concerns the linkages between regeneration, education and job training and employment. There is a need for policy-makers and academic researchers to work towards a common agenda and a shared discourse. In the final analysis, the study of distressed areas can reveal much about the nature of larger urban economic and social processes. But the responsibility of government to act means making some informed judgement about how to intervene, and why intervention is necessary, even on the basis of imperfect information.
PurposeThe paper discusses the relationship between systemic inequity and wealth disparity and advocates for expanding employee share ownership as a strategy to address divides in income and wealth by race and gender. It targets diverse actors including policymakers, philanthropic leaders and social investors and presents a set of policy proposals and practice ideas that seek to advance a broader understanding of employee share ownership and build the capacity of key organizations to support employee-owned businesses.Design/methodology/approachThis paper draws on data indicating positive outcomes from employee share ownership programs (ESOPs) related to job quality, economic stability and wealth-building, as well as widespread political support for ESOPs.FindingsThis paper suggests that employee share ownership can help to strengthen job quality and address race and gender income and wealth gaps. It argues that there is both public support and a range of different strategies actors can implement to expand awareness and access to different forms of employee share ownership.Research limitations/implicationsAdditional research focused on other forms of employee share ownership (beyond ESOPs) is needed to deepen understanding of how each form can play a role in addressing racial and gender wealth inequities. The paper acknowledges that despite the potential of employee share ownership to mitigate racial and gender wealth gaps, additional simultaneous strategies are required to address the range of systemic barriers that have disproportionately limited women and people of color's participation in ESOPs.Practical implicationsPolicymakers are actively seeking new proposals, while philanthropic leaders, social investors and others are also eager to build awareness and understanding of employee ownership models and develop the institutional capacity necessary to support strong employee-owned businesses. This paper directly responds to these needs and contributes to a broader collaborative effort to spread employee share ownership policies and practices that support economic recovery and lay the foundation for a more equitable and resilient economy.Social implicationsEmployee share ownership is not yet a strategy that is well understood among policymakers and the public, but it connects to and supports outcomes that are top of mind for many, including increasing local ownership and bolstering local economies, helping small business owners retire in ways that preserve local jobs and businesses, strengthening job quality and workforce development, addressing racial inequity and economic inequality and providing workers greater voice and agency. This paper seeks to connect employee ownership to these high-priority issues and support efforts by a range of organizations to implement policy and practice solutions.Originality/valueThis paper fulfills an identified need to aggregate recent research on the relationship between employee share ownership and wealth inequities on the basis of race and gender. It also offers a timely argument that employee ownership strategies can play an important role in responding to the challenges facing communities and workers – particularly women workers and workers of color – as we rebuild from the COVID-19 pandemic.
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