Employee Ownership Day 2015 focuses on public services

Public services exploring a transition to employee ownership are the focus of this year’s Employee Ownership Day, which aims to celebrate and raise awareness of the business model in the UK.

Employee ownership is a business model in which employees have a stake in their company, have a say about how the business is run and benefit from its success. Research suggests that employee-owned businesses outperform their non-employee owned counterparts in terms of profitability and productivity.

To coincide with the event this year, the Employee Ownership Association has developed and launched a new guide on employee ownership specifically for public sector organisations.

Iain Hasdell, chief executive of the Employee Ownership Associated, commented, “This new guide is essential reading for all those interested in employees owner public service spin outs, and we are delighted to launch it on Employee Ownership Day 2015.

“These organisations are performing brilliantly, and play an important part in the ongoing growth of the employee owned sector.”

According to the Employee Ownerships Association’s the top 50 employee owned businesses have combined sales of £21.5 billion and 164,000 employees. Over the last year these businesses have increased sales by 4.6% and staff by 4.3%.

Unsurprisingly, high street retailer John Lewis takes the top spot in the Employee Ownership Top 50 2015, followed by engineering and management consultancy Mott MacDonald Group and Arup Group, a design and engineering consultants, all three firms are 100% owned by employees.

Some 24 of the firms making the list are entirely owned by employees, with business activities ranging from retail and wholesale to health and social care, demonstrating that the business model can work for a variety of sectors.

Photo: acerin via Freeimages

Further reading:

Social bank Unity Trust to reward staff with ownership shares

Employee Ownership Day: business model is a ‘growing economic force’

Diversity in business forms can deliver sustainable growth, says report

New FTSE index to encourage investment in employee ownership firms

Unity Trust: the bank for the social economy