W.L. Gore - Stories of Two Employees - Two Short Videos:

How can employee compensation and benefits be used for competitive advantage?

In 2020, W.L. Gore earned a spot for the 21^st time on Fortune Magazine’s list of 100 Best Companies to Work For. You can check out that announcement here: https://www.gore.com/news-events/press-release/gore-named-to-fortune-100-best-list-2020.

View both of the interviews with current Gore employees and review Section 8.6.

Besides winning a place on Fortune’s Best Companies list, Gore is known for both an unusual organizational structure and a very unique approach to employee compensation. The part that is very different at Gore is the way they handle internal raises and promotions. Co-workers on the same team rank each other based on contributions to the company for the year. Team members may provide comments explaining why they ranked a co-worker that way, as well as identify strengths or suggest areas for improvement of the associates they rank. This information is then used for determining raises. (Source: Lepak & MGowan, Human Resource Management, 3e, 2017, p. 403.)

This 2019 article from Inc Magazine discusses compensation as well as culture at Gore: https://www.inc.com/magazine/201905/deirdre-van-dyk/w-l-gore-goretex-eptfe-waterproof-material-medical-device-technology.html

After your complete your research, think about these two questions:

What are the pros and cons of this method of evaluation and compensation?
Especially after viewing the videos, would you want to work for this W. L. Gore? Why or why not?

Video 1: Alicia's Story

Video 2: Mark's Story:

Video 3: First Impressions

Transcript