Owning Plexus: Manifesto of an Employee-Owner

An Employee Stock Ownership Plan (ESOP) sounds great on paper, but how well does it work in practice? That depends on whether the company's leaders embrace an ownership culture, trust their employee-owners, commit to big ideas, and make smart decisions.

In 2009, Scott Bradford was an employee-owner at Plexus Scientific Corporation, an ESOP that had gone badly awry. He tried to save it. He failed.

"Owning Plexus" was an unheeded warning--an effort to identify and solve the company's problems b...