Jointly written by Sylvia Raskin and Natalya Pemberton
Worker cooperatives can foster economic resilience in individuals and communities. Built on common principles and values that foster respect, cohesion, and accountability, they raise the value of member income by distributing wealth more equitably through profit sharing, as well as salaries and benefits (Webb, 2016). In the interests of scaling worker cooperatives and their impact, there are various movements in the US to develop them. For example, organizations such as Project Equity, a California non-profit, help to facilitate the process for business owners to sell their companies to their workers. But the conversion itself is just one small part of the challenge facing a newly-minted worker co-op in the US. The workers (including, in some cases, the original owners who may have stayed on as worker-owners in the new enterprise) must learn to operate as a cooperative business, including fostering a robust ownership culture in which workers feel and act like owners of the business.
We’ve developed five teaching modules designed to help cooperative organizations train new worker-owners to effectively manage and participate in their cooperative.
Collaborate and Learn
The modules are designed to stimulate participants to think about and practice some of the core capabilities and systems associated with ownership culture, in the frame of cooperative worker rights. These lesson plans have not yet been tested with participants or edited for time (our original plan was to create one-hour sessions but some of the themes lend themselves more to half-day sessions). However, they represent a proof of concept that could be iterated on in the future and potentially plugged into existing ownership culture training and consultancy by organizations like Project Equity.
The format of the modules varies slightly from topic to topic, but all modules are centered around Essential Questions and Essential Learnings, which are designed to help participants “make connections and see the big picture” (Davenport, n.d.). The modules also correspond to particular themes from Scholl & Kapischke’s “4 Pillars of Cooperative Governance” (referred to in the modules as the “4 Pillars”) and Fairbairn’s “Three Strategic Concepts for the Guidance of Cooperatives” (“3 Concepts”). The style of teaching in the modules is largely Socratic, in keeping with our objective to stimulate thinking and practice, rather than simply providing information.
Foster a culture of belonging
Edgar Schein defines culture as “learned patterns of beliefs, values, assumptions, and behavioral norms that manifest themselves” in observed behavior (Schein, 2017). It is difficult, therefore, to pinpoint any definitive set of capabilities, processes, or structures that comprise or build an ownership culture. However, our research and analysis suggest there are some especially helpful factors at the individual and systemic level:
Core capabilities, including:
Capacity for autonomy, participation, and influence;
Accountability;
Vulnerability;
Leadership;
Decision-making; and
Systems for workers to empower themselves to be accountable and make good decisions, including the creation and operation of democratic systems.
These capabilities, structures, and processes build on a foundation of fundamental rights and responsibilities that pertain to worker-owners because of their nature as human beings, workers, and cooperative members in order to foster an ownership culture, we believe it’s critical to base skills development, personal growth, and structures and processes for worker-owners in the context of exercising and advocating for their rights.
Workers who consistently demonstrate cooperative responsibilities create a workplace culture that supports rights education, use, advocacy, and fulfillment. The impact of the reinforcing loop between cooperative rights and responsibilities produces conditions for both social and economic business success through workers who are engaged, motivated, and empowered. Worker education and training extends beyond the walls of the co-op as workers who experience ownership culture and participate in a truly democratic institution are more likely to participate in other social and political institutions. Through rights and ownership training and participation, the co-op can create impact that is both linked to the business and that extends into our larger society.
REFERENCES
Davenport, L. (n.d.). Asking Essential Questions To Inspire Lifelong Learning. Retrieved from https://www.rubicon.com/essential-questions/
Fairbairn, B. (2003). Three Strategic Concepts for the Guidance of Cooperatives: Linkage, Transparency, and Cognition. Center for the Study of Cooperatives, University of Saskatchewan. Retrieved from https://www.coopfoodstore.com/sites/default/files/3_strategic_concepts.pdf
Mackin, C. (1998, July 10). Self-Direction and Employee Ownership. Retrieved from http://www.ownershipassociates.com/selfdir.shtm
Mackin, C. (1997). Four Challenges of Building an Ownership Culture. Presented at International Conference on Employee Ownership and Business Success, Bled, Slovenia, October 23 - 24. Retrieved from https://www.ownershipassociates.com/challeng.shtm
Nayar, V. (2014, August 07). Three Differences Between Managers and Leaders. Retrieved May 31, 2017, from https://hbr.org/2013/08/tests-of-a-leadership-transiti
Pinchot, G. & Pinchot, E. (1994). The End of Bureaucracy and the Rise of the Intelligent Organization. San Francisco: Berrett-Koehler Publishers.
Schein, E. (2017). Organizational Culture and Leadership. (5th edition). Jossey Bass, San Francisco.
Scholl, M. & Kapischke, J. (2014, Mar-Apr). Four Pillars of Cooperative Governance, Part 2: Practical applications of a new co-op model. Cooperative Grocer. Retrieved from http://www.grocer.co-op/articles/four-pillars-cooperative-governance-0
Scholl, M. & Sherwood, A. (2014, Jan-Feb). Four Pillars Of Cooperative Governance. Cooperative Grocer. Retrieved from http://www.grocer.co-op/system/files/legacy_files/four-pillars-of-cooperative-governance.pdf
Sherwood, A. & Taylor, K. (2014, Aug). Unique Expectations of Cooperative Boards: Taking on the Challenges of the Democratic Enterprise. International Journal of Cooperative Management. Vol. 7. No. 1. Pages 29-42. Retreived from https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Keith_Taylor4/publication/266476464_Unique_Expectations_of_Cooperative_Boards_Taking_on_the_Challenges_of_the_Democratic_Enterprise/links/55b27c7708aed621ddfe0db3.pdf