The unique ‘direct and integrated’ institutional arrangements of a democratic employee-owned business: The case of Gripple Limited

The study investigates the ‘direct and integrated’ democratic employee-owned (for-profit) business (DEOB) model of Gripple Limited as part of GLIDE (Growth Led Innovation Driven Employee Company Limited), a non-profit industrial foundation. It draws on a programme of in-depth employee-owner interviews on the ability of institutional arrangements (collective processes and communal-relational strategies) to mitigate mission drift (an imbalance between commercial and social logics), downside drift (moving towards oligarchy) and socioeconomic inefficiency from the degradation of property (return and control) rights. The investigation of Gripple’s unique institutional arrangements includes an internal market-maker system (skin in the game) and incentive policies (sacrifices) as part of bilateral hostage posting.