W. L. Gore & Associates

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CASE W. L. Gore & Associates
Terri Kelly is the president and CEO of W. L. Gore & Associates. For the past 16 years, Gore has consistently been named among the “100 Best Companies to
Work For” in the United States by Fortune magazine. Gore is now one of only a few companies to appear on all of the U.S. “100 Best Companies to Work For”
lists since its initiation in 1984. In a recent interview, Ms. Kelly was asked what would be the most distinctive elements of the Gore management model to an
outsider. She listed four factors: “We don’t operate in a hierarchy; we try to resist titles; our associates, who are all owners in the company, self-commit to
what they want to do; and our leaders have positions of authority because they have followers.” According to CEO Kelly, these four attributes enable Gore to
maximize individual potential while cultivat-ing an environment that fosters creativity and also to operate with high integrity. She is quick to remind everyone
that all of Gore’s practices and ways of doing business reflect the innova-tive and entrepreneurial spirit of its founders. Those founders are Bill and Vieve
Gore, who in 1958 set out to create a business where innovation was a way of life and not a by-product. They founded W. L. Gore & Associates. There is no
doubt that the Gores’ vision has been realized. Gore is a uniquely managed, privately owned, family business. Today Gore is best known for its Gore-Tex
range of high-performance fab-rics and Elixir Strings for guitars. Gore is the leading manufacturer of thousands of advanced technology products for the
medical, electronics, industrial, and fabrics markets. With annual revenues of $3.2 billion, the company employs more than 10,000 employees, called
associates at more than 50 facilities around the world. Gore is truly a modern day success story. CEO Kelly attributes Gore’s success to its unique culture.
How work is conducted at Gore and how employees relate to one another sets Gore apart. There are no titles, no bosses, and no formal hierarchy.
Compensation and promotion decisions are determined by peer rankings of each other’s performance. To avoid dampening employee creativity, the
company has an organizational structure and culture that goes against conventional wisdom. W. L. Gore & Associates has been described as not only
unmanaged but also unstructured. Bill Gore (the founder) referred to the company’s structure as a “lattice organization.” Gore’s lattice structure includes the
following features:
• Direct lines of communication—person to person—with no intermediary • No fixed or assigned authority
• Sponsors, not bosses • Natural leadership as evidenced by the willingness of others to follow • Objectives set by those who must “make them happen” •
Tasks and functions organized through commitments • Complete avoidance of the hierarchical command and control structure.
The lattice structure as described by the people at Gore encourages hands-on innovation and discourages bureau-cratic red tape by involving those closest
to a project in deci-sion making. Instead of a pyramid of bosses and managers, Gore has a flat organizational structure. There are no chains of command, no
predetermined channels of communica-tion. It sounds very much like a self-managed team at a much broader scale. Why has Gore achieved such
remarkable success?
W. L. Gore & Associates prefers to think of the various people who play key roles in the organization as being leaders, not managers. While Bill Gore did not
believe in smother-ing the company in thick layers of formal management, he also knew that as the company grew, he had to find ways to assist new people
and to follow their progress. Thus, W. L. Gore & Associates came up with its “sponsor” program. The sponsor program is a dyadic relationship between an
incumbent, experienced employee and a newly hired, inex-perienced employee. Before a candidate is hired, an associate has to agree to be his or her sponsor
or what others refer to as a mentor. The sponsor’s role is to take a personal inter-est in the new associate’s contributions, problems, and goals, acting as both
a coach and an advocate. The sponsor tracks the new associate’s progress, offers help and encouragement, points out weaknesses and suggests ways to
correct them, and concentrates on how the associate might better exploit his or her strengths. Sponsoring is not a short-term commitment.
All associates have sponsors, and many have more than one. When individuals are hired, at first they are likely to have a sponsor in their immediate work
area. As associates’ commitments change or grow, it’s normal for them to acquire additional sponsors. For instance, if they move to a new job in another
area of the company, they typically gain a sponsor there. Sponsors help associates chart a course in the organization that will offer personal fulfillment while
maximizing their contribution to the enterprise. Leaders emerge naturally by demonstrating special knowledge, skill, or experience that advances a business
objective. An internal memo describes the three kinds of sponsor-ship and how they might work: • Starting sponsor—a sponsor who helps a new associate
get started on his or her first job at Gore, or helps a present associate get started on a new job.
• advocate sponsor—a sponsor who sees to it that the associate being sponsored gets credit and recognition for contributions and accomplishments. •
Compensation sponsor—a sponsor who sees to it that the associate being sponsored is fairly paid for contributions to the success of the enterprise.
An associate can perform any one or all three kinds of sponsorship. Quite frequently, a sponsoring associate is a good friend, and it’s not uncommon for two
associates to sponsor each other as advocates. Being an associate is a natural commitment to four basic principles articulated by Bill Gore and still a key
belief of the company: fairness to each other and everyone we come in contact with; freedom to encourage, help, and allow other associates to grow in
knowledge, skill, and scope of responsibility; the ability to make one’s own commitments and keep them; and consultation with other associates before
undertaking actions that could affect the reputation of the company. Over the years, W. L. Gore & Associates has faced a number of unionization drives. The
company neither tries to dissuade associates from attending organizational meetings nor retaliates against associates who pass out union flyers. How-ever,
Bill Gore believes there is no need for third-party representation under the lattice structure. He asks, “Why would associates join a union when they own the
company? It seems rather absurd.” Commitment is seen as a two-way street at W. L. Gore & Associates—while associates are expected to commit to making
a contribution to the company’s success, the company is committed to providing a challenging, opportunity-rich work environment, and reasonable job
security. The company tries to avoid laying off associates. If a workforce reduction becomes necessary, the company uses a system of temporary transfers
within a plant or cluster of plants, and requests voluntary layoffs. According to CEO Kelly, Gore’s structure, systems, and culture have continued to yield
impressive results for the company. In the more than 50 years that Gore has been in business, it has never made a loss.
Go to the internet : To learn more about W. L. Gore & Associates, visit its Web site (http://www .gore.com). Support your answers to the following questions
with specific information from the case and text or with other information you get from the Web or other sources.
1. What theories from this chapter are revealed through the case?
2. How did Gore’s “sponsors” program facilitate the cre-ation of high-quality relationships among leaders, sponsors, and associates?
3. Evaluate followership at W. L. Gore & Associates. What company actions and/or policies account for the quality of followership?
4. Would you characterize the leadership style at W. L. Gore & Associates as job-centered or employee-centered (Chapter 3)? Support your answer.
5. Based on the types of power discussed in the text, what type(s) of power do sponsors have in their relationships with associates (Chapter 5)?
6. What role, if any, does coaching play in W. L. Gore’s lattice structure (Chapter 6)?

 

Sample Solution

Section I: INTRODUCTION TO THE STUDY Introduction The country is encountering a basic deficiency of medical care suppliers, a lack that is supposed to increment in the following five years, similarly as the biggest populace in our country’s set of experiences arrives at the age when expanded clinical consideration is vital (Pike, 2002). Staffing of emergency clinics, facilities, and nursing homes is more basic than any time in recent memory as the huge quantities of ‘gen X-ers’ start to understand the requirement for more continuous clinical mediation and long haul care. Interest in turning into a medical caretaker has disappeared lately, likely because of the historical backdrop of the extraordinary and requesting instructive cycle, low compensation, firm and extended periods of time, and fast ‘wear out’ of those rehearsing in the calling (Wharrad, 2003).

A complex oversaw care climate in this country is restricting the dollars accessible to be spent on nursing care. Numerous wellbeing callings, particularly nursing, have the standing of ‘eating their young’ as opposed to offering compelling coaching to develop future medical services suppliers. Because of these variables, the quantity of medical attendants has diminished and businesses regard themselves as understaffed and seeking able work force. Before 2001 the decay had been apparent for a considerable length of time (Sadler, 2003). Nursing schools, public pioneers, medical services pioneers and the overall population is impacted by the absence of Registered Nurses (RNs) accessible.

As the populace ages, the assumption is that a rising number of RNs will be required essentially to keep up with the ongoing degree of medical care. Furthermore, the momentum ecological and political worries of expanding pandemic sickness, event of synthetic and catastrophic events, and expanding dangers of war, requires critical expansions in the medical services labor force (Jefferys, 2001). The public nursing lack and factors that increment the interest for expanding the nursing labor force notwithstanding public, state, and nearby debacles make the potential for a general wellbeing emergency. Nursing programs have endeavored to satisfy need for medical attendants by expanding enlistment and campaigning effectively for expansions in program subsidizing by schools and states for understudies.

Tragically, the issue of nursing understudy weakening hampers the best endeavors of nursing programs and irritates the public lack of Registered Nurses in the United States (Ofori, 2002). In 2003, the National League for Nursing revealed a positive vertical pattern in the nursing labor force supply in any case, the American College of Healthcare Executives (2006) detailed that in 2005, 85% of emergency clinic directors decided medical clinics needed more enlisted medical attendants to fulfill patient consideration needs. The United States Bureau of Labor insights showed by 2014, more than 1.2 million new and substitution nursing positions would be expected to meet the public medical services needs (Ramsburg, 2007).

Various broad endeavors to diminish weakening have been made by nursing programs including reinforcing affirmation methods and executing maintenance programs. Unfortunately, the issues of weakening keep on continuing nursing schools the nation over. Admission to a nursing program is serious and numerous potential understudies are denied confirmation every semester. Steady loss from nursing programs influences not just the particular understudy who is acknowledged to a nursing program and ineffective, yet in addition the understudy denied confirmation that might have been effective. Steady loss rates are expensive to understudies, nursing projects, and medical services the same by diminishing the quantity of likely alumni from schools of nursing and adding to the nursing lack. Many examinations feature the a lot higher than wanted whittling down rates for nursing understudies and endeavor to decide expected scholar and non scholastic contributing reasons for this undesired weakening rate (Ostrye, 2001).

As indicated by Barr (1999), there is a lack of information accessible on what elements impact understudy achievement; in any case, scholastic indicator factors neglect to make sense of every one of the variables that influence understudy execution completely. Many college’s affirmation divisions commit significant time and cash for the enrollment and confirmation of nursing understudies. Besides, confirmation sets up are entrusted with the perpetually troublesome charge of recognizing candidates who can find success. Enlisting qualified candidates is only the starting move toward encouraging project culmination.

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