Foundation for Enterprise Development

06/14/2017

Files for our books, SAIC Solution and Names, Numbers, and Network Solutions are on their way to the Beyster Institute Rady School of Management, UC San Diego. Also making their way across town, our files of 30 years of programs advancing research, education, and the practice of entrepreneurship and employee ownership. These will be part of the Special Collections UCSanDiego Geisel Library

06/05/2017

On behalf of the Foundation for Enterprise Development (FED)’s board of trustees, I am pleased to announce an organizational transition of the FED from an operating foundation to a donor advised fund. This transition decision was made after more than a year of strategic planning including discussions with our staff, university collaborators, and the Beyster Family, and will be complete by June 16, 2017.

We mark this transition with an upcoming name change to the Beyster Foundation for Enterprise Development (BFED) for this new fund. In addition to supporting the mission via grants, we anticipate BFEDover time investing assets to be aligned with FED's mission.

Over the past 30 years, the FED's program success has been enhanced through strategic collaborations and partnerships with businesses, foundations, the U.S. government, and academia. We are confident that our ongoing grant support through our new BFED fund to key universities and non-profits will continue helping entrepreneurs and companies adopt employee ownership, and ensure ongoing support of research evidence for policy reform.

The newly updated www.fed.org website has more information about this transition, and the FED-sponsored programs that we expect to continue with BFED.

I want to thank my board of trustees (David Binns, Tom Darcy, Steve Fisher) for believing in the FED’s mission and providing excellent advice and support for decades. I want to thank the FED staff and volunteers (Bianca Helm, Moira Feighan, Jill Neal, Teresa George, Jere Buffington, Mindy Pawinski) who have shown a passion and resolve to the quality of our programs and operations.

On behalf of the Foundation for Enterprise Development and Beyster Family, I want to thank you for important support to our mission, ongoing encouragement to me over the past decade, and friendship to my father and the Beyster family.

We have achieved a lot together over the last 30 years, and I am excited to continue involvement through the BFED to effective change in entrepreneurship and employee ownership.

Like and follow the BFED-sponsored program at:
https://www.facebook.com/Beyster-Foundation-for-Enterprise-Development-528215380902348/

https://twitter.com/BeysterFED

In honor of its 30th year anniversary, The Foundation for Enterprise Development (FED) transitioned from an operating foundation to a new ownership structure, a donor advised fund, called the Beyster Foundation for Enterprise Development (BFED). Starting July 1, 2017, as a purely granting organizati...

06/01/2017

Employee ownership requires new investment in order to get to scale. A new report by Mary Ann Beyster, president and trustee of the Foundation for Enterprise Development (FED), published by the Fifty by Fifty initiative of The Democracy Collaborative, examines the investing landscape for potential opportunities in employee ownership. The report, Impact Investing and Employee Ownership, reports on the results from six months of research showing that the opportunities for impact investors to support employee ownership are limited, but that an investing infrastructure is beginning to emerge across asset classes.

http://www.fiftybyfifty.org/impactinvesting.html

Copyright © 2016

05/08/2017

A new publication is available via Oxford University Press titled, The Oxford Handbook of Mutual, Co-operative and Co-owned Businesses. "The Handbook is a collection of 42 contributions to the debate and understanding of the sector, from researchers, economists and practitioners with a deep understanding of the issues at hand." Edited by Joseph Blasi, J.R. Beyster Professor at Rutgers University; Carlo Borzaga, president of the European Research Institute on Cooperatives and Social Enterprise (Euricse); and Jonathan Michie, director of the Oxford Centre for Mutual and Employee-owned Business.
https://www.thenews.coop/117076/topic/business/review-oxford-handbook-mutual-co-operative-co-owned-businesses/

New Handbook explores the resilience of co-ops and their ongoing popularity

05/08/2017

Next time you go to NYC, stop by The Grand Central Oyster Bar to enjoy great food, lively environment, and inspiring employees and owner/s! This is the type of future we want for employees!
https://www.eater.com/2017/5/4/15530546/grand-central-oyster-bar-james-beard-nyc

Owner Jerome Brody was very loyal to the union and management staff

05/02/2017

On behalf of the Foundation for Enterprise Development and Beyster Family, we are excited to announce the opening of a new resource, the J.R. Papers at the UCSD Library Special Collections. Photos from the April 21st opening celebration are attached. It is our hope that there will be important learnings for today’s practice and future policies by looking back on approaches used by the founder, and this highly decentralized, entrepreneurial, and employee-owned organization, SAIC.

Additional comments and photos can be found on Dr. Beyster blog at www.beyster.com.

The Special Collections will also now include thirty years of the Foundation for Enterprise Development (FED) programs and history. FED has focused on research, education, and services that advance innovation, entrepreneurship and broad-based ownership. This additional archive material is particularly timely to celebrate the FED’s 30-year anniversary.

While reaching this milestone, we have decided to make a transition with the FED to be a purely granting fund by July 1, 2017, and we mark this transition with an upcoming name change to the Beyster Foundation for Enterprise Development (BFED). We are confident our grant support to key universities and non-profits will continue helping entrepreneurs and companies adopt employee ownership, and ensure research evidence for policy reform. Additional details will be announced in the coming weeks.

One of Dr. Beyster’s favorite posters was “None of us is as smart as all of us.” This poster was given to him by his wife, Betty, and hung in his office at SAIC. It now hangs in Mary Ann’s, his daughter, office at the FED. He showed that business does not have to be a not a zero-sum game. That is, you can “win”, and I can “win” too. Simply stated, yet hard to do. We are so pleased that the J.R. Papers and FED Archive will be yet another resource for those who wish to embark on that journey.

Photos courtesy of Dan LaSusa, UC San Diego.

04/27/2017

The Beyster Institute announces the wonderful news of hiring Jenny Briggs, the former human resource and organizational director of New Belgium Brewery. She is an awesome force for positive change for employee engaged and led organizations. It has been our pleasure to work with her in the past years at conferences, training, and screenings of We the Owners, which highlights the culture of employee ownership and high employee involvement .
https://www.brewbound.com/news/beyster-institute-hires-jennifer-briggs

The Beyster Institute at UCSD’s Rady School of Management announced today that Jennifer Briggs, formerly a senior executive with New Belgium Brewing Company, is joining the Institute.

04/15/2017

New report released by . "how businesses can be both competitive in the marketplace and generate social value at large scale."
https://www.thenews.coop/115423/sector/worker-coops/co-operation-businesses-can-deliver-social-benefit-success/

04/15/2017

Joseph Blasi, J. Robert Beyster Professor of Employee Ownership, shows how the percent of employees nationally receiving stock options has fallen significantly, and why we should care.

http://fortune.com/2017/04/12/tech-stock-market/

And what Washington can do about it.

04/06/2017

We are excited to announce the 2017-2018 Beyster Fellow, Marjorie Kelly. Marjorie is author of many articles and books that shape corporate and community thinking toward shared ownership models. Her book, Owning Our Future: The Emerging Ownership Revolution, was released June 2012 by Berrett-Koehler, and it places broad based employee ownership in the context of other key forms of ownership for a regenerative economy. As a leader of 50 by 50 with , Marjorie is focusing on scaling employee ownership through improved financial tools and systems design. http://democracycollaborative.org/content/marjorie-kelly

03/24/2017

Proud of Certified Employee-Ownedfor the outstanding research and entrepreneurial spirit in translating research into value for customers and employee-owners.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/darrendahl/2017/03/11/consumers-are-willing-to-pay-more-for-products-made-by-employee-owners/

Consumers are willing to pay more for products made by employee-owners on par with organic and fair trade certified brands.

03/24/2017

Read more on a new employee-ownership index for responsible investing. Launched OwnershipAustraliaNew Zealand

http://www.hcamag.com/opinion/opinion-employee-ownership--giving-employees-a-reason-to-succeed-234030.aspx

HR managers who want happier employees and stronger companies with a healthier bottom line should consider taking a plan for an employee ownership scheme to their next C-suite meeting, new research ...