WL Gore & Associates: Examining its Unique Management Approach

Desklib provides solved assignments and past papers to help students succeed.

COMPETITIVE STRATEGY &
INNOVATION
CASE STUDY OF “WL GORE & ASSOCIATES”
1

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
The report of competitive strategy and innovation analyze the management and operation of
the WL Gore & Associates. The unique management and operations of the company makes it
different from other companies. They give complete freedom to all its members ignoring the
hierarchal and traditional method of the management. The report includes the features,
advantages and disadvantages of the WL Gore & Associates.
2

Contents
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY.................................................................................................................................2
INTRODUCTION...........................................................................................................................................4
QUESTION 1:................................................................................................................................................4
QUESTION 2:................................................................................................................................................8
QUESTION 3:..............................................................................................................................................10
CONCLUSION.............................................................................................................................................12
REFERENCES..............................................................................................................................................13
3

INTRODUCTION
Strategic management can be defined as the policies and procedures adopted by the company
for achieving the organizational goals and objectives. This process helps the companies to grab
the opportunities available in the business environment (Wheelen et al., 2017). This assignment
is about the management and leadership practices adopted by the W.L. Gore & Associates in
their organization. W.L. Gore & Associates is a basic company that put together the concept of
other companies which have a large corporate structure. The main aim of providing the
different range of creativeness to the employees is that they provide maximum benefits to the
most important asset of the organization. The company prefers to imposed sponsor program
rather than appointing the managers and leaders for their operations. Gore believes that
corporate hierarchy can reduce the creativity level of the employees (Harder and Townsend,
2017). W.L. Gore & Associates follows a lattice structure which is a very complex and difficult
structure having no hierarchy, titles and conventional structures. They give the name to only a
few hierarchies because it was required by the law. This structure follows a direct channel of
communication involving no other intermediary to communicate with the individual.
QUESTION 1:
Features of WL Gore's organization and management
W.L. Gore & Associates is a distinctive structure company that allows the employees to adopt
their own style of working for the betterment of the organization. The features of the W.L.
Gore’s organization and management are as follows:
1. Experimental learning
In general, the employees are providing proper training for getting their job done but in
the case of Gore's organization, they are taught as they face the situations. They get
practical knowledge as the situation arises. The most important advantage of this
method is that they get the knowledge of the real world and the disadvantage of using
this method is that it may be time-consuming method because the employees can only
4

implement experimental learning when they have theoretical knowledge about the
situation (Li et al 2018).
2. Follows lattice structure
The WL Gore follows a lattice structure which is one of the most difficult structure as
compared to other organizational structure. It is so because in this organization the
management does not emphasis on defining the title, position, corporate structure and
hierarchy of the organization. Therefore the employees share their problems with other
members for getting the solution to the problem. Further, in this structure, the
organization does not define the authority that is the major advantage of this structure
because there are so many employees who can’t handle the working style of their
superior and they also feels that are have sufficient knowledge to deal with a particular
situation.
3. Democratic style of leadership
In the WL Gore & Associates, the employees are free to their own decisions as well as
they can also encourage others in their work but it must be in favor of the company. The
required consultation is only when they damage the organization in a serious way. For
encouraging their decisions the company even did not give titles of bosses to any
individual but in return, they have some expectations from the employees (Khan et al.,
2015).
4. No HRM policy
The company does not have any policy related to HRM such as recruitment, selection,
training, remuneration, etc. The employees can take their position according to their
interests and talents but under the guidance and support of a sponsor. In addition to
this, the new candidates can join the organization and can work as other employees are
working in the company. In terms of remuneration, the workers of the WL Gore &
Associates the employees are paid according to their contribution to the organization.
The employees are intrinsically motivated to gain knowledge about their job and to
work hard and better and for achieving this they start taking the risk, perform creatively
as well as up to their highest level (Xu et al., 2016).
5

5. Open communication system
WL Gore & Associates encourage open communication system in the organization.
There is no hierarchy to share information with different levels of the organization;
however, there is no hierarchy structure in the company. The employees decide their
own associates i.e. to whom they want to follow or ask for the solution of the problem.
The performance evaluation of the employees is done through peer evaluation in which
all the peer members evaluate the performance and behavior of the employees with
them (Wadley et al., 2018). The owner of the company believes that open
communication encourages new ideas in which the employees are free to put
themselves in the desired place and finds the answers to the problems.
6. Insist on small organizational units
Bill Gore believes that small working teams interact in a better way as well as it creates a
better professional environment. They take a particular task to produce a product which
must be completed on time by involving each member of the team. They all work
willingly according to their interest and also they are not over-burdened with the stress
of the boss. As a result, the performance of the employees will improve and the chance
of becoming a productive leader is very high (Ashkenas et al., 2015).
Consistent management approach based upon identifiable principles
The WL Gore & Associates mainly follow the four principles that ensure consistent management
approach and these are the following:
 Freedom
Freedom of the employees can be ensured by allowing them to achieve their own
objectives by fully utilizing their capacities. The company rewards them for their ideas as
well as encourages their mistakes because they think that mistakes are part of
creativity.
 Fairness
The consistent management approach can be achieved when all the employees in the
organization will be treated fairly in all circumstances and also in every interaction with
6

the colleagues, customers as well as suppliers. Freedom will help the employees in
increasing their knowledge, skills, responsibility, etc. by helping and communicating with
other individuals (Kerzner, 2017).
 Commitment
It is the most important principles of the organization because employees make their
own commitment and try their best to keep them. This is because the tasks are not
assigned by any of the members of the organization rather they take their own
decisions. Therefore these principles say that if the employees are not allowed to break
the commitment expect any exceptional situation because they make a commitment to
their own tasks.
 Waterline
This principle states that the employees must consult with other associates before
performing any actions which affect the reputation of the organization or financial
position of the company.
7

QUESTION 2:
Advantages and disadvantages of WL Gore's approach to organization and management
Advantages of WL Gore’s approach to organization and management
 It facilitates clear communication
The Gore focuses on building and maintaining a relationship with the customers,
suppliers as well as colleagues. The open communication motivates the people to
maintain a long-term relationship with the people. The communication methods used
by the company are email, face-to-face interactions as well as telephone when they
have to communicate with others.
 Encourages individual accountability
The lattice structure of the Gore’s organization is free from the bosses as well as
managers and is totally based on non-hierarchal structure. The individual becomes the
leader based on the respect they gain from the peer members. It is the responsibility of
the individual to manage their own workload as well as accountable to their team. The
members are expected to perform their own work for which they make their
commitment (Ferguson et al., 2017).
 Encourage individual’s passion
The members in the lattice structure are passionate about their work. In addition to this,
they are focused and self-motivated to perform their task. This structure gives the
feeling of ownership and pride that members can do whatever they want to do but it
should be beneficial for the company.
 It requires no supervision and dominance
The members of the WL Gore & Associate are intrinsically motivated and they search for
the ways to gain knowledge and skills from other members. The sharing of information
and knowledge increases trust as well as create a feeling of belongingness among the
team members. They share their resources along with the skills to find out the solution
of the particular problems (Kasemi et al., 2016).
8

Disadvantages of WL Gore’s approach to organization and management
 Rewards and compensation
The main disadvantage found in Gore's organization that discourages the efforts of
many members is that the compensation structure is not according to the skills, talents,
and expertise of the members. The efforts of all members are calculated on the same
ground, therefore some the chances of innovative and creative ideas decrease if they do
not get the rewards accordingly (Karthikeyan, 2017).
 The ineffective strategy of evaluation
The evaluation strategy adopted in Gore's organization is peer evaluation. This
evaluation strategy has many disadvantages such as the effect of personal relationship
can be seen on evaluation, if the relationship of the members is not good then they will
not give a good rating to the other. The second disadvantage of this method is that it is
not necessary that the members have interaction with all the members of the
organization. This affects the overall rating of the individual.
 Lack of motivation
In the lattice structure, it becomes very difficult for the company to find out the
employees who are self-motivated and willing to work for the organization. As
compared to hierarchal structure, the employees get the reward for their extra efforts
but in case of the lattice structure, the employees get demotivated if their performances
are not rewarded properly (Harder and Townsend, 2017).
 Delay in decision-making
The major disadvantage that WL Gore & association is that the company follows a lattice
structure that affects the timing of decision making. The decisions are made when all
the members agree with the same decision and this involves a large amount of
interaction with the associates. Delay in the decision-making process can be a result of
lattice structure and it is the main disadvantage as compared to the hierarchal structure
(Eberwein and Tholen, 2018).
9

QUESTION 3:
The extent to which WL Gore approach to organization and management transferable to
other companies
In the current scenario, the management style used by the organizations is not satisfactory for
the employees and even they are not ready to work under the traditional method of
management. The factors that contributed to this transformation are technological, economic
as well as demographics. The company must come with innovation and creativity for gaining a
competitive advantage over its competitors. There are several traditional methods that bound
the creativity of the employees (Grant, 2016).
The company follows the lattice structure that is different from the traditional hierarchal model
as it is more flexible and adaptive to meet the changing environment of the business and also
the norms and requirement of the modern workroom. The lattice structure is a three-
dimension structure that allows the organization as well as members to extend it in any track
(Wang et al., 2018). For instance, Gore introduced the new management approach that is
applicable to all organization. This approach focuses that the innovation is not only required in
any product or services but it must also be combined with the leadership style. In this
leadership, the motivation of the employees must be according to their level of productivity.
The management and operations of WL Gore are designed in a way that it must meet the needs
of the members working in the organization. The flexible working time and work facilitate the
employees to maintain the balance between the work and personal time (Amaral et al., 2016).
The assignment of the task is done by the members themselves, therefore, they have complete
freedom to assign less or more duties according to their time and capabilities. The flexible
working structure improves the productivity and profitability of the organization. If the
companies are able to meet the expectation of the employees that they make a better
attachment with the organization and they are willing to contribute more innovative and
creative ideas for the betterment of the company (Wei et al 2015). The owner of the WL Gore &
Association believes that every employee has something unique that can enhance the
10

profitability and productivity of the organization. But the organization must give them complete
freedom and authority to share with the management.
The lattice approach also encourages the participation of all employees because they consider
that all the decisions will be applied to the employees so the decisions must be made with their
consent. This structure promotes decentralization where employees have complete democracy.
From Fayol’s principle of management, “Espirit de corps” is the one principle that says that the
company should work in a team because it brings harmony and good feelings among the
employees. The same approach is applied in Gore's organization and it is in a bottom-up
approach. Moreover, the Gore is not known as an organization but it is family who works in a
team. This will be shocking to know that the company can generate more than $2.5 million
without following the hierarchal management style (Godwin et al., 2017).
Other companies focus on reducing the number of employee's turnover but according to Gore's
organization structure, they focus on a strategy that must reduce the costs incurred on the
recruitment and selection of new candidates. This can be achieved through a lack of supervision
and monitoring of the employees that motivate them to remain in the organization for a long
period of time. The environment of creativity is developed only when the employees have
complete freedom to do whatever they want to do but it must be for the betterment of the
organization (Harris et al., 2017).
Further, the organizational structure of Gore says that in any organization the employees do
not need close supervision but a little guidance and support. Every new candidate can learn the
management style of the company by introducing them with the team that helps him in their
work and to clearly define the expectations of the team from their level of expertise. The leader
plays an important role in influencing the behavior of the employees. This practice helps in a
medical professional when the superior guide the junior on how to provide better services to
their customers (Arena et al., 2017).
11

CONCLUSION
W.L. Gore & Associate is one of the largest manufacturers of chemicals having operations in
more than 24 countries with more than 8500 employees. The company was known for its
unique style of management and operations. The company follows a lattice structure of
management which does not include hierarchal structure, bosses and chain of commands. The
report of competitive strategy and innovation includes the unique features of W.L. Gore &
Association for managing and operating its day-to-day activities. In addition to this, the report
also includes the advantages and disadvantages of WL Gore's approach to management and
operations. Further, this does not include the features and advantages of the company but it
also includes how other companies can use lattice structure for increasing productivity and
profitability of any organization.
12