Distinctive features of WL Gore’s organization and management

The Gores began from an ordinary basement office and expanded into a distinct production unit in Newark considered to be one of the hometowns in Delaware. Initially, the company reported dwindling sales following the launch of the first product. However, after seven years of establishment, the company employed close to 200 people (Grant, 2016). It is during this time that Gore began to adopt and initiate some of the management systems that were uniquely coupled with a company philosophy that would be recognized by employees. Gore began to acknowledge the fact that with the growth of the company, efficiency and productivity also began to decline. Thus, he required a different management structure. However, he feared that the pyramid management structure that had become popular and fashionable at the time impeded creativity and innovation, which he highly valued. As opposed to using the pyramid structure, Gore invented his system.

It is during the world war II while on duty at DuPont that Gore came to learn of a different kind of organizational framework known as the lattice system. The lattice system was created to facilitate the ingenuity and the general performance of a team working towards achieving a common goal. The lattice prioritized on communication and cooperation as opposed to the hierarchy of authority. Under the lattice system adopted by Gore, any employee could decide provided such decision remained fair, supported others and made engagements to the company. A consultation was only engaged in decisions that were deemed to cause severe damage to the company. New associates joined the company and had the same authority as any other employees that had joined Gore earlier. Gore also did not encourage the use of titles and bosses and had only a few exemptions and commands been substituted with individual commitments.

New workers also began working in jobs that they were best suited that matched their talents with the help and direction of a sponsor. More responsibilities came along as the employee progressed in the company and employees were paid based on their contribution. The members of a team knew members of their team who were productive thus they would not accommodate poor performance making such groups have job pressure. Employees promoted themselves by gaining immense knowledge and working tirelessly on a daily basis (Hamel, 2007). The competition was an inward thing among employees and as such employees competed with no one apart themselves. The impact of the system was to motivate employees to be creative, be risk takers and perform at optimum giving the best that there is.

Advantages and disadvantages of WL Gore’s approach

Bill Gore’s ideas with regards to management were influenced by Douglas McGregor’s book and were published later as Gore’s principles that guided the company during the start-up phase. With it the book expounds two management models, one is the conventional model approach deeply embedded in Taylor’s scientific model of management (Hamel, 2010). The other model is Weber’s principle of bureaucracy that was termed as theory X. Its contents relied on the assumption that work is not enjoyable and that workers are only motivated by money, and the primary role of management is to protect the company from shirking. On the other hand, theory Y is based on the work developed by human relations from the school of management and assumes that people are self-motivated, enthused to solve problems and have the ability to work in harmony on tasks requiring a joint effort.

Another key component in Gore’s management thinking is aligned to the limits regarding the size of the company. Bill Gore believed in the importance of interpersonal trust as it would translate to organizational effectiveness declining once the company reached the 200 members size. Thus in 1967 as opposed to expanding the Delaware facility, Bill and Vieve opted for another manufacturing unit located in Flagstaff, Arizona. It is from that time onwards that Bill Gore always built a new unit every time the existing unit reached the 200 mark of associates.

Malcom Gladwell perceives that Gore’s persistence on small units of organizational structure is based on the principle adopted by Robin Dunbar, an anthropologist. Dunbar asserts that social groups are constrained by people’s ability to handle sophisticated social relationships.

The Gore organizational structure does not entail components of hierarchy. For instance, a corporate entity, it is bound by law to have a board of directors chaired by Bob Gore. The company also has a CEO, Terri Kelly. The company has four sectors namely the fabrics, medical, industrial and electronics and each has a leader that is recognized. (Caulkin, 2008) The divisions also have particular business units that are a function of an array of products. Gore also has specialized, enterprise-wide functions, for instance, the human resources and information technology. The only thing lacking is the codified ranks and positions. The associates at Gore are anticipated to adapt their roles to suit their skills and talents. The fundamental organizational units are small and self-managing groups.

The relationships between teams depend on the concept of lattice as opposed to the conventional hierarchy (Boos, et al., 2014). The whole idea of lattice is embedded in the fact that every member is linked to other members of the organization in a specific facility. As for the lattice, communication is based on peer to peer as opposed to the superior-subordinate relationship. According to Bill Gore, this seemed a more natural way of organization. He observed that in most formal setups it was the informal connections that were responsible for getting things done. Bill Gore acknowledged that most people including him were used to having formal procedures and doing things by following protocol.

Transferability of WL Gore’s approach to other companies

New associates are given a sponsor, and the role of the sponsor is to familiarize the new employee to the company a guide them through the lattice. The new hire then spends time with several teams in the first few months following their employment. The responsibility of finding the perfect match is left to the team and the associate. However, an associate can find a new sponsor in the process.

The peers do reviews on an annual basis and information is collected from twenty other associates. Every associate is then ranked against other associates within the group based on the contribution made overall. It is the ranking that determines the compensation to be given.

Gore values leadership through the most vital principle is that of natural leadership. The success of convening a meeting and people show up means that one is a leader in Gore (Gore, 2018). It is the responsibility for the teams to appoint team leaders and the same groups have the power to replace such leaders (Lian & Tui, 2012). Thus, team leaders are accountable for their teams. People who are used to giving orders and having things done may get disappointed at Gore as snapping fingers does not constitute people doing anything at Gore. Team leaders are tasked with developing the concept of followership where goals are articulated with the hope that people perceive that it makes sense to them.

Compared to other conventional management models with Gore’s management model, the model where one leader is sturdy and gives the command and always in control may seem attractive in the simplest (Northhouse, 2007). However, in reality, it would be impractical to anticipate one leader to have all the solutions and through history, it has been proven that depending on fixed control mechanisms does not shun catastrophic outcomes from occurring. It is thus crucial to rely on a network of individuals and leaders who have shared values and own individual ownership for the general success of the company. Therefore, as companies grow and expand with regards to their size and complexity, it is crucial to have leadership load spread (Rowe, 2007). An organization’s capacity only when increases when leadership load is distributed and spread among leaders deemed competent on the ground. It is such leaders that can utilize and make optimal knowledge-based decisions.

The talented new employees who act as an addition to the existing workforce adapt with a lot of easiness in the distributed type of management compared to the traditional types of management. Young individuals recognize the fact that they have choices and are not fixed or tied to one organization and thus they can move to any organization where they believe that they will have better opportunities. Therefore, companies using the traditional models of management find it hard to retain talents deemed to be the best. However, there are risks associated with shifting to the distributed model of management as it may be a hurdle to the executive management as it requires the change of values, attitudes and even the compensation systems which are core to the operation and success of most companies (Wu, et al., 2010). Thus, such a shift commands shifts within the company ranging from valuing only a few to valuing the contributions of the many. Such people will command to feel that they have people who represent them so that they can be heard. Leaders in such a context will need to identify that their primary function is to motivate others while developing their power. Such leaders will operate by no title and will have no authority to command people what to do.

WL Gore’s adoption of the lattice system

The leadership focus shifts to that of creating and advancing a conducive environment that inculcates the right values capable of building and developing leaders. Thus, leaders in this environment know that they are leaders only if they have disciples and that such followership needs to be developed on a daily basis. Most important is that their contributions are measured by the same people they lead.

It is evident that most compensation systems are build to rely on executive management to evaluate the effectiveness of the leader. Such a view can be limited and biased because managers are the very same people that put such people to lead. Individuals who know their leaders can be said to be best positioned to be the people being led. If people are to have a voice in the company, then they should have a voice when it comes to choosing and assessing their leaders.

Gore has found it meaningful and crucial to use the peer ranking system. Thus, associates are accorded the opportunity to rank individuals from their team with the inclusion of their leaders. The associates develop a creation list that ranks based on the people they believe that made the most significant contribution to the success of the company. Such an approach serves as the best platform of checks and balances when it comes to identifying individuals for their contributions and also in recommending people for the general leadership.

Advantages

Bill Gore developed his company based on a set of norms and principles that inform the decisions made in the company, in work done and in the behavior of employees towards others. The company believes in the strong culture that connects Gore associates globally on one accord (Val & Kemp, 2012).

Belief in the individual enables the company to trust the employees such that they feel energized and motivated to stand for the company and do the right thing for the company. The power of small groups where the lattice company utilizes fast modes of decision-making reducing bureaucracy, diverse aspects, and cooperation among the small teams.

People are moving in the same direction (Rodrigo, 2017). Gore associates are also identified as co-owners of the enterprise through such schemes such as the associate stock plan. This does not only the company to share the risks and rewards but also gives Gore an incentive to remain focused on achieving its long-term success. Thus, the company feels that it is in such an effort together with its employees enabling the company to prioritize what is the best in general in the process of decision making.

The absence of hierarchy in Gore’s organizational structure

Gore also has a long-term goal. The investment decisions made by the company are made based on long-term benefits and on basic beliefs that are not to be overlooked for short-term gains.

The company has developed guiding principles. For instance, freedom where Gore was designed to be an enterprise where associates can quickly achieve their goals and objectives by channeling their efforts towards the company’s success. (Manz, et al., 2009) Action in this context is valued and prized, and ideas are highly encouraged. Also, making mistakes is deemed part of the creative process. Gore defines freedom as motivating other employees to grow regarding knowledge, skill set, responsibility, and other activities considered necessary for ushering in success (Sharma & Jain, 2013). Gore expects that associates will exceed the desired outcome when accorded the freedom.

The aspect of fairness where all people at Gore strive to exercise and remain fair with others, the suppliers and customers and with other stakeholders the company conducts business with. Gore believes in not assigning tasks but rather motivating employees to make their commitments with the company (Grønning, 2016). All employees at Gore make consultations with other associates before implementing and making decisions that might lead to damaging the company.

The working culture at Gore is unique where the objective of the company is to make money and its employees should have fun in such activities that generate revenue and the company still hold that concept five decades later (Hamel, 2010). Thus, since everybody at Gore is considered part of the company through the associate stock plan, associates at Gore expect more from their counterparts.

Disadvantages

With the lattice organizational structure, talent management, recruitment and retaining staff is done traditionally, and the conventional recruitment and selection components are ideally nonexistent (Gore, n.d.). The compensational system as per the lattice company structure cannot develop compensational frameworks based on the qualifications and the level of skills. The compensation and performance in the lattice structure lose their value. Gore himself admitted the difficulty that arose in implementing compensation variables when he asserted that it was not logical for employees to set their compensation.

Whereas the conventional organizational structures deemed performance evaluation as a vital component responsible for employee development the lattice organization is deficient of the necessary steps needed to develop performance standards (Morgan, 2015).

In the lattice form of management employees are accountable of themselves and as such policies that provide direction in a conventional workplace are hard to implement in a lattice form of management leading to a chaotic form of working environment.

Gore’s emphasis on natural leadership

Companies in the field of medicine can cope and adopt this type of management because they can handle high demand and competitiveness demanded in such an industry which is identical to Gore’s operation (Deloitte, 2013). Big decisions and commitments are also required in such an industry, and only a few firms can manage such; however, companies in the field of medicine can handle as they are identical to Gore’s department of medicine thus there are similarities shared by the two companies.

Conclusion

Gore’s management approach reflects how innovation in management styles can lead to better management in new firms without the use of conventional management styles. Giving workers the freedom to work on their own accords them autonomy of the highest standards which is responsible for the innovation and creativity needed for the creation of new products. The role of sponsors is highly encouraged in Gore’s leadership, and further have the freedom to change their sponsors.

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