Employee Share Ownership Plans: A Review

This paper reviews the main strands of research on employee share ownership over the last forty years. It considers research findings in the literature on types of share ownership, the incidence of share ownership plans, the ‘determinants’ of the use of share plans by companies, influences upon employee participation in share plans, the effect of share ownership on employee attitudes and behaviour, the effect on company performance, and the relationship between share ownership plans and other forms of employee participation. The paper does not provide a comprehensive review of the literature on these topics: instead it highlights the main findings that have emerged in the literature to date, and suggests some avenues for future research. It is suggested that majority worker ownership is different in character and effects from ‘mainstream’ minority employee share plans in large companies but the literature has tended to conflate the two. It is argued that future research needs to distinguish the various forms of employee share ownership if the impact of share ownership is to be more precisely calibrated

Effect of Leaf Area on Tomato Yield

The influence of leaf area on tomato yield was evaluated, both by simulations and experimental work. Simulated crop growth results from daily crop gross assimilation rate minus maintenance respiration rate, multiplied by a conversion efficiency factor. Dry matter partitioning is simulated based on the relative sink strengths of the plant organs. Within the plant, individual fruit trusses and vegetative units are distinguished. Leaf area increase is calculated based on temperature, unless a maximum specific leaf area is reached. In the standard situation leaves from a vegetative unit are removed one week before the truss above this unit is harvest ripe. Leaf removal could also be based on maintaining a desired leaf area index (LAI). Measurements at 7 farms showed that in the summer season light interception was on average 90%, with values varying between 86% and 96%. Three different LAI treatments were tested by picking different numbers of old leaves. Reference, high and maximum LAI resulted in average LAI of 3.3, 3.6 and 4.1 m2 m-2, respectively, and equal yields of 66 kg m-2. The model predicted a yield increase of 1.5% for the maximum LAI treatment compared to the reference, with LAI being input to the model. Simulated yield when leaf picking was based upon a desired LAI of 4, was 4% higher than for a desired LAI of 3, with hardly any effect at higher LAI. Simulations showed that removal of young leaves favored partitioning to the fruits but decreased LAI and total yield. However, if removal of old leaves was delayed such that an LAI of 3 m2 m-2 was maintained, removal of every second young leaf improved yield by 10%. Methods of optimizing yield by controlling LAI are discusse

Employee Stock Ownership and Financial Performance in European Countries: The Moderating Effects of Uncertainty Avoidance and Social Trust

This study investigates how the effect of employee stock ownership on financial performance may hinge on the diverse cultural and societal contexts of European countries. Based on agency and national culture theories, we hypothesize that the positive relationship between employee stock ownership and return on assets (ROA) is stronger in those nations with lower uncertainty avoidance and higher social trust. Using a multisource, time‐lagged, large‐scale dataset of 1,741 firms from 21 countries in Europe, our multilevel, random coefficient modeling analysis found evidence for these hypotheses, suggesting that uncertainty avoidance and social trust serve as important contextual cues in predicting the linkage between employee stock ownership and financial performance. Our supplemental analysis with distinction between the managerial and nonmanagerial employee stock ownership further indicates managerial employee stock ownership has a direct positive effect on ROA. Although nonmanagerial employee stock ownership had a nonsignificant association with ROA, the relationship was positive and significant when uncertainty avoidance was low and social trust was high. This research contributes to the existing literature by illuminating some of the contextual influences altering the effectiveness of employee stock ownership. Our findings also offer practical suggestions for effectively using employee stock ownership

The Feasibility of High-Resolution Peripheral Quantitative Computed Tomography (HR-pQCT) in Patients with Suspected Scaphoid Fractures

Introduction: Diagnosing scaphoid fractures remains challenging. High-resolution peripheral quantitative computed tomography (HR-pQCT) might be a potential imaging technique, but no data are available on its feasibility to scan the scaphoid bone in vivo. Methodology: Patients (≥18 years) with a clinically suspected scaphoid fracture received an HR-pQCT scan of the scaphoid bone (three 10.2-mm stacks, 61-μm voxel size) with their wrist immobilized with a cast. Scan quality assessment and bone contouring were performed using methods originally developed for HR-pQCT scans of radius and tibia. The contouring algorithm was applied on coarse hand-drawn pre-contours of the scaphoid bone, and the resulting contours (AUTO) were manually corrected (sAUTO) when visually deviating from bone margins. Standard morphologic analyses were performed on the AUTO- and sAUTO-contoured bones. Results: Ninety-one patients were scanned. Two out of the first five scans were repeated due to poor scan quality (40%) based on standard quality assessment during scanning, which decreased to three out of the next 86 scans (3.5%) when using an additional thumb cast. Nevertheless, after excluding one scan with an incompletely scanned scaphoid bone, post hoc grading revealed a poor quality in 14.9% of the stacks and 32.9% of the scans in the remaining 85 patients. After excluding two scans with contouring problems due to scan quality, bone indices obtained by AUTO- and sAUTO-contouring were compared in 83 scans. All AUTO-contours were manually corrected, resulting in significant but small differences in densitometric and trabecular indices (<1.0%). Conclusions: In vivo HR-pQCT scanning of the scaphoid bone is feasible in patients with a clinically suspected scaphoid fracture when using a cast with thumb part. The proportion of poor-quality stacks is similar to radius scans, and AUTO-contouring appears appropriate in good- and poor-quality scans. Thus, HR-pQCT may be promising for diagnosis of and microarchitectural evaluations in suspected scaphoid fractures

The fit of employee ownership with other human resource management practices: Theoretical and empirical suggestions regarding the existence of an ownership high-performance work system

This article embeds employee ownership within a strategic human resource management (SHRM) framework, and in so doing, aims to redress in part a lack of attention in previous employee ownership and SHRM literatures. The study extends the configurational approach to SHRM to include the construct of the workforce philosophy as the factor that determines the coherence of HRM systems. Companies that have employee ownership as a central element and core HRM practice should do two things in order to ensure that their HRM system is coherent and potentially a high-performance work system (HPWS). First, these firms should propagate the idea that employees deserve to be co-owners and take employees seriously as such. Second, the HRM system should reflect this workforce philosophy: the HRM system should contain HRM practices that mirror the rights that make up the very construct of ‘ownership’. The core HRM practices of the ‘ownership-HPWS’, in addition to employee ownership, are: participation in decision-making, profit sharing, information sharing, training for business literacy and mediation

Employee Financial Participation

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Employee Ownership and High-Performance Work Systems in Context

Contains fulltext : 179779.pdf (publisher's version ) (Closed access)This chapter addresses employee ownership within a strategic human resource management (SHRM) framework that has gained increased attention. The study extends the configurational approach to SHRM and argues that the construct of the workforce philosophy is the primary factor that determines the coherence of HRM systems. In other words, the workforce philosophy propagates the idea that employees both deserve to be co-owners and must be taken seriously as such. In addition, the chapter argues that the HRM system should reflect this workforce philosophy: the HRM system should contain HRM practices that mirror the rights that comprise the very construct of “ownership.” We present the possible core HRM practices of the “ownership high-performance work system (O-HPWS),” which, similar to employee ownership, produces favorable outcomes. The chapter also addresses the important mediating role of employees’ perception and attributions related to employee share ownership in the relationship of the HRM system (with employee share ownership) to favorable outcomes

Added Value of Employee Financial Participation

This chapter broadens our understanding of the added value of employee financial participation. Financial participation is a generic term for the participation of employees in profit and enterprise results including equity of their employing firm. In general, there are two forms of employee financial participation: profit-sharing and employee share ownership (including options). While profit sharing is considered as an incentive for employees with positive individual and organizational level outcomes, employee share ownership adds to that a share holding element where employees may consider themselves as co-owners of the firm, including the possibility of voice and control. In this chapter we review the current literature on the impact of financial participation and show that in most cases the literature shows positive effects on outcomes. However, the literature also shows that financial participation is not a HR instrument that produces the results mainly in a generic way, but that the best results can be achieved when embedded in a configuration of HR policies and practices, which we call ‘high performance ownership system’