Involving employees increases efficiency

It is the middle of the day at the cooling technology company, Johnson Controls, in Århus. Four or five people have gathered in front of a large blackboard which lists the short term tasks that need to be solved. A couple of the people are representatives of the management, the others are workers who represent one or more of the company’s approximately 20 autonomous groups. None of the workers have formal management status, some of them are chosen by colleagues, but in many groups the workers’ roles shift between the groups’ members who, broadly speaking, view themselves as equals. When the meeting at the blackboard is over, the workers return to their own groups, who together take the decisions about how the concrete tasks can best be solved.

“For many years we have had an informal tone in the company, so production is divided out to the groups without a great deal of control from above. Out in the groups we agree amongst ourselves who does what,” explains Ove Larsen, who is senior shop steward at Johnson Controls.