Creative Jobs at W. L

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Foreign Trade University Faculty of Business Administration Department of Management & Human Resource Module: HRM (QTRE403) Lecturer: Ngô Quý Nhâm Email: quynham@gmail.com Case Unit02: Creative Jobs at W. L. Gore When the husband-and-wife team of Bill and Vieve Gore founded W. L. Gore & Associates, their aim was not just to make and sell products from high-tech materials. Rather, they believed they could create a thriving, creative organization by giving smart people a chance to fully use their talents and ideas. They believed creativity could be stifled by rigid structure and hierarchy, so they built their company without managers, assigning teams of employees to work on opportunities. Thus, at W. L. Gore, work flow is often about ideas as well as products. To produce good ideas, the company needs scientists and engineers with a profound understanding of their field of expertise, be it chemistry or the fabrication of a new prototype. At the same time, the company’s long-term success requires that it back only ideas that will meet real market needs, so expertise must extend to business knowledge coupled with a willingness to terminate projects that have little chance of success. This pairing of skill sets is especially powerful when an innovation isn’t working out because Gore employees are gifted at analyzing the idea to see what aspects can be carried over into new projects, so the company builds on ideas. Also related to business skills, Gore employees must be good at communicating with customers, who can help the company identify needs and assess the value of ideas. This combination of skills is broad because jobs at Gore are broadly defined; in contrast, at many other companies, scientists and engineers communicate mainly with other technical experts, leaving customer communication and market knowledge to the sales force. The basic principle for

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