Employee Ownership: A Viable “Distributist” Option for Enterprises Operating in Romania?

The business ownership structure greatly affects the long-term success of the enterprise in motivating employees, maintaining financial stability and building organizational resilience. Employee ownership of firms, therefore, is a subject that has elicited much interest as it controls productivity, commitment and innovation. This paper presents an analysis of such potential within the Romanian economy while also elaborating on attendant advantages and challenges. While foreign literature has extensively documented the impact this model has had in Western economies, where it is asserted to have a positive effect on firm performance, there is little research for Romania and the ‘traditional’ structures still dominate. This study attempts to take up a little portion of this void by presenting an applicatory insight into this model based on its relevancy to present Romanian circumstances. A review of literature available related to that data which was obtained forms part of the methodology. The key question raised in this paper is how far from the employee ownership of Romanian companies will enhance organizational performance and their job satisfactions as emanating from such ownership. The results indicate that employees’ participation in the ownership structure increases staff retention, productivity, and company survivability during economic hardships. This may also enable a fairer wealth distribution and a more stable labor climate, moving, in terms of economic doctrines, toward what is called the distributist doctrine. This paper tries to look at the feasibility of such a model in Romania based on what little value there is that this model can be one of those sustainable strategies through which Romanian enterprises increase their competitiveness.