Contemporary Strategy Analysis, 10th Edition

Case 22W. L. Gore & Associates: Rethinking Management*

If a man could flow with the stream, grow with the way of nature, he'd accomplish more and he'd be happier doing it than bucking the flow of the water.

—W. L. GORE

Malcolm Gladwell (author of The Tipping Point and Outliers) described his visit to W. L. Gore & Associates (Gore) as follows:

When I visited a Gore associate named Bob Hen at one of the company's plants in Delaware, I tried, unsuccessfully, to get him to tell me what his position was. I suspected, from the fact that he had been recommended to me, that he was one of the top executives. But his office wasn't any bigger than anyone else's. His card just called him an “associate.” He didn't seem to have a secretary, one that I could see anyway. He wasn't dressed any differently from anyone else, and when I kept asking the question again and again, all he finally said, with a big grin, was, “I'm a meddler.”¹

The absence of job titles and the lack of the normal symbols of hierarchy are not the only things that are different about Gore. Since its founding in 1958, Gore has deliberately adopted a system of management that contrasts sharply with that of other established corporations. While the styles of management of all start‐up companies reflect the personality and values of their founders, the remarkable thing about Gore is that, as a $3.2 billion company with 9500 employees (“associates”) in 25 countries of the world, its organizational structure and management ...