1.
Associates have the freedom to encourage,
help, and allow other associates to grow in
knowledge, skill and scope of responsibility.
2.
Associates should demonstrate fairness to
one another and everyone with whom they
come into contact.
3.
Associates choose their own commitments
and they should keep them.
4.
A waterline situation involves consultation
with other associates before undertaking
actions that could influence the reputation or
profitability of the company and otherwise
‘sink the ship’.
Gore ignores the conventional wisdom when
it comes to production. Although the company
manufactures a vast range of products ranging from
medical devices to guitar strings, it limits the size
of the employee base at a plant to approximately
250 workers – small for a company comprising
9 000 employees. The underlying philosophy is
that the cost savings from large plants cancels out
the loss of efficiency and productivity that is a
consequence when employees do not know one
another well.
Committees at Gore determine performance,
following a comprehensive review process. Every
year, each team ranks every member relative to
all of the others by asking them who has made the
biggest impact on the organisation. They leave the
question deliberately undefined, to allow people
to interpret it as they wish. Special committees
sort through the rankings and use it as the basis
for decisions on compensation. The process
works because associates perceive it as being fair.
All associates are part owners of the company
through a stock plan; therefore, Gore associates
expect much more from one another in terms of
innovation and creativity, high ethics and integrity,
and making commitments and delivering on them.
Gore is more informal than most workplaces.
Relationships between associates are open and
informal, and everyone is treated respectfully
and fairly. This type of environment naturally
promotes social interaction and many associates
have made lifelong friends with those they met
working at Gore. Because the organisation views
its associates as their most valued asset, they try
to provide tools and resources to allow flexibility
in balancing work/life needs. This includes
internal training, continuous learning, and external
education, resource and referral programmes for
childcare, adoption assistance, domestic-partner
benefits, and flexible work hours.
While all of these processes sound very
complex, the feeling at Gore is that it contributes
to a freer, more innovative and flexible workforce.
Bill Gore once commented that the aim of the
organisation is to make money and to have fun
doing so, and the results seem to bear this out.
Although Gore is private, it has been growing
revenues
consistently
for
the
last
decade.
