Beyster Fellowship Symposium

The Beyster Fellowship Symposium is a unique forum for interdisciplinary scholars interested in the study of broad-based employee ownership and profit sharing. The symposium brings together scholars from all over the country in one place.

These scholars have been identified under various fellowships and are studying different aspects of employee ownership and profit sharing including (but not limited to) impacts on personal, firm, and economic health and performance, corporate culture, leadership, incentives in new and existing enterprises, equality and diversity, business sustainability and responsible investing.

2010 Symposium: Re-Capitalizing the Economy

More than 50 scholars throughout the country, and from Canada, and Taiwan convened at the La Valencia Hotel in La Jolla, from June 27 to 30 to discuss their research findings at the second annual symposium.

The theme of the 2010 Symposium is Re-Capitalizing the Economy: Envisioning the Role of Broad Employee Ownership. How should we create, use, organize and own capital in our society? This refers to company stock that owns the capital of corporations, pools of capital concentrated in various funds, the capital provided by nature's abundance, human capital we build in organizations, and the social capital in organizations and communities.

The researchers came from business schools and engineering schools as well as from economics, history, organizational development, and philosophy departments. In general, the researchers agree that employee ownership has been shown to have significant positive effects for companies and employees, although there are important exceptions.

Much of the new research is focused on looking closely at pressing national issues (such as the decline of the middle class, widening inequality gap, employee discontent, innovation gaps, jobloss) and how broad-based ownership and an ownership culture can support more sustainable and responsible forms of capitalism to address these issues. More information on topics presented.

2009 Inaugural Symposium: Shared Capitalism - Setting a Scholarly Agenda

The first symposium was held July 2009 in La Jolla, CA. It drew over 40 academics, including many Beyster Fellows, who shared their research findings and also participated in an MIT Enterprise Forum panel discussion, which was attended by more than 200 people. See videos above.

The 2009 symposium proceedings document the dialogue that occurred about the definition of employee ownership, the main research issues and themes to be addressed, and the practical aspects of conducting research in this field. More information via email to inquire@fed.org.