Employee Ownership Blog

Nancy Wiefek

Research on Federal Datasets Finds Employee Ownership Companies More Productive

A new research paper, Employee Share Ownership, Management Practices, and Labor Productivity: An Analysis Using Establishment Level Micro-Data from the U.S. Census, addresses long-standing questions about ESOPs and productivity. The research team, led by Fidan Ana Kurtulus at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, compiled the largest and most comprehensive data to date on broad-based employee ownership at both privately held and publicly traded US manufacturing companies. Specifically, they combined three restricted US Census micro-databases—the 2010 and 2015 Census Management and Organizational Practices Survey (MOPS), the American Survey of Manufacturers (ASM), and the US Longitudinal Business Database (LBD)—with the US Department of Labor’s Form 5500 Private Pension Plan (PPP) database.

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Corey Rosen

New Book by HB Global CEO Makes the Case for Employee Ownership

In Beyond Your Ownership: How Employee Ownership Can Align Your Purpose, People, and Profit, Bob Whalen, the CEO of ESOP-owned HB Global, and Jamie Dykstra, who helped write the book, draw on the company's remarkable history since becoming ESOP-owned to demonstrate the power of employee ownership. Whalen bought the commercial and residential contractor in 2008 when it had 133 employees. He sold it to an ESOP in 2010 but remains the CEO. The company has grown to 1,700 employees, partly through organic growth, but significantly through an active acquisition program. HB Global has done over 30 acquisitions, a few of which have been funded by its separate business unit, HB Capital, which acts as its own special-purpose private equity firm that buys target firms and ultimately sells them to an independent ESOP or HB Global. 

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Corey Rosen

Canada Makes Employee Ownership Trust Tax Incentive Permanent

In 2024, Canada enacted legislation that exempts the first $10 million (Canadian) in gains from the sale of a business to a qualifying employee ownership trust (EOT). The exemption was set to be available only until the end of 2026. The government’s proposed 2026 budget would have eliminated the incentive, but after a campaign by supporters of the new law, the spring 2026 government budget update will make it permanent. 

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NCEO Events & Webinars

Are Your Digital Assets a Hidden Risk to Ownership Value?

Most leaders of employee-owned companies spend considerable time managing financial, operational, and compliance risks. Digital assets, however, rarely receive the same level of structured oversight. In a recent NCEO webinar, Digital Asset Risk Management: Protecting Employee-Owned Companies, John Weller at SteadyRain made the case that this gap represents a meaningful and often underappreciated threat to long-term ownership value.

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Corey Rosen

Norwegian Sovereign Wealth Fund CEO Says Employee Ownership Belongs on Every Board's Agenda

Norway's main sovereign wealth fund is the Government Pension Fund Global. The fund is managed by Norges Bank Investment Management, whose CEO Nicolai Tangen recently wrote on LinkedIn that “As evidence for employee share ownership continues to grow, companies face a choice. They can concentrate ownership narrowly, or they can use employee ownership as a strategic tool to improve returns and build more resilient companies. The financial case for the latter is compelling. This should be on every board’s agenda.” Tangen states that the fund has consistently voted its shares in favor of proposals for employee ownership plans. 

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Corey Rosen

New Report on Business Owner Perspectives on Selling to Employees

A new report by Adria Scharf and Matt Mazewski of Rutgers and Oyindamola Ijewere of Wilmington University, Business Owner Perspectives on Selling to Employees: Insights from In-Depth Interviews (PDF), chronicles 24 stories of why business owners decided to sell to an employee ownership plan. While most sold to an ESOP, there are also examples of sales to worker cooperatives and employee ownership trusts. The 46-page report also describes how these plans work. 

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Corey Rosen

New DOL Guidance Suggests Lighter Hand on ESOP Litigation

On April 14, the Employee Benefits Security Administration (EBSA) in the Department of Labor (DOL) laid out its new enforcement priorities in Field Assistance Bulletin 2026-01. The memo states that these priorities will be:

  • Focusing enforcement on the most egregious conduct and significant harm;
  • Ensuring, whenever possible and consistent with the EBSA's mission, that the EBSA does not regulate by enforcement and instead promotes fairness, prior notice, and clarity to the regulated community;
  • Requiring proper review by senior agency officials of all critical enforcement initiatives; and
  • Committing to timely and responsive enforcement.

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NCEO Events & Webinars

From Ownership Structure to Ownership Mindset: Lessons from HFA Enterprises

When HFA Enterprises converted to 100% employee ownership on Halloween 2022, it committed to a fundamentally different way of governing and running a company. In a recent NCEO webinar, Ryan Ray and Dave Wilgus of HFA joined NCEO board member and moderator Howard Kaplan to share what they've learned. Their story offers a practical look at what it takes to build governance that actually serves employee-owners.

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