Lincoln Electric Company: Case Analysis Of The Lincoln Electric Company

The Lincoln Electric company, under the leadership of James F. Lincoln saw a major shift in the way business was to be directed and operated with visionary mind-set emulating companies like Ford, Wal-Mart, Merck, 3M as focus was towards the customer’s needs and employee’s compensation. Philosophically customer needs become critical as the reason for being in business and the employees also being the vehicle in achieving the needs of the customers as the case study by Sharplin, A (1989, p.3) clearly positions the companies aspirations. James Lincoln places much importance on the relationship with employees that is guided by mutual respect and individual effort.

Lincoln Electric Company was founded by John C Lincoln in 1906 starting with a start up business in a one room, 4th floor factory to a bigger building and started to expand his workforce to 30 people and had a great expand in their sales as it grew over $50,000 a year. He was humble, preferably to be an engineer and inventor rather than sitting around being labelled as manager. The company also gave each of their employee as paid-up life insurance policy in the 1915. After 2 years, welding schools are introduced. A year after the success of forming a welding school, employee bonus plan was attempted.In the 1919 's, Lincoln Electric 's employees association are formed to introduced some social activities and health benefits to care for the workers. After becoming General Manager, in 1925; a purchase stock plan are enable for all employees. Lincoln bonus plan was finally accepted as a trial by the Advisory Board in 1934.

The strategy of Lincoln electric is known for its highly unique ideas for paying working according to the number of pieces they produced at works which means higher performance and productivity leads to higher pay roll. He believed in generating the best productivity and utilizing the company’s resources properly. A global organization is complex and has different task and requirement which needs different skills, education, experiences, knowledge and background. And that is why there is different kind of degree and education is available. Each major requires specific knowledge, like marketing, management accounting etc. the companies have segment in its organization also which divides the members into different groups each group have

The founders of the Lincoln Electric Company left a legacy of an organization culture that promotes high productivity through sound management policies which have stood the test of time. The exponential growth of the company after the death of James F. Lincoln was a direct result of the establishment of a rich culture mix based on values that were widely shared and accepted by the members of the organization. Management empowered employees to become part of the decision making process through the contribution of ideas through the Advisory Board which was elected by the employees from amongst themselves. Reward management systems and all the other artifacts of the Lincoln Electric’s distinguished strong organizational culture will be analyzed in greater detail in this essay.

Lincoln Electric (LE) has been a producer of electrical and welding technology products since the late 1800's. The company remained primarily a family and employee held company until 1995, then approximately 40% of its equity went to the public. James Lincoln, one of the founders, developed unique management techniques that effectively motivated the employees. These management techniques were implemented as an unusual (for the era) structure of compensation and benefits called "incentive management". The incentive management system consisted of four key areas: factory jobs based solely on piecework output; a year-end bonus that could equal or exceeded an individual's regular pay; guaranteed employment; and limited benefits. Management

Every organization has values and beliefs that define what they do and how they do things in the organization. These values have significant influence on how the employees behaves and the general performance of the organization – it is these set of values and beliefs, rooted deep in the company’s organizational structure that depict the “dos”, “don’t” and the “hows”, of the organization and these unequivocally represents the culture of the organization. This concept became popular in the 1980s when Peters and Waterman in their book: “In search of Excellence” presented the profound argument that, the success of any organization is inextricable linked to the quality of its culture. (Carpenter, M., Taylor, B., Erdogan, B. 2009 p183). The purpose of this paper is an attempt to analyse the impact diverse cultures played in the success of the Lincoln Electric Company.

Organization culture which is a system of shared assumptions,values,and beliefs showing people what appropriate and inappropriate behavior can best be analysed in the Lincoln Electric Company from the P-O-L-C Framework as below.

Primary features of the Lincoln Electric business model and employment system are displayed through the company’s overall strategy, philosophy, compensations and benefits policy, leadership, and communication within and outside the organization.

The Lincoln Electric Company was a legacy company from which the families ' personal values were incorporated in the beginning and continue to be the fundamental beliefs compromising the company 's culture. By creating and implementing a culture of service, respect, and loyalty, the Lincoln Electric Company has become an institutional leader in American business standards. Lincoln 's culture cannot be summarized by a single dimension of cultural analytics because of its multifaceted culture that is innovative, outcome-oriented, people-oriented, and team-oriented

With the years going by, Lincoln Electric Company, despite its excellent performance in production, has been growing in a very steady speed, and never really grew to a large scale company.

After analyzing the story of Lincoln Electric Company I’ve come to the Conclusion that their organizational culture they practicing is People-oriented culture. Because the company values fairness, supportiveness and they respect individual rights. There is a greater emphasis on expectation of treating people with respect and dignity.

Elements of Lincoln Electric’s management system that made it so popular in the U.S. such as piece-rate work, bonuses, and

In Lincoln Electric, communication steps between the CEO and production workers are set-up very simple as it only has two to three steps in maximum. Flexibility of organisational operation would be maximised through the horizontal organisation structure. Good communication between the upper and lower sides also has been subserved. Consequentially this simple and flexible organisational structure helps the employees to solve the issues occur in the workplace subjectively with authority. This kind of organisational structure was possible since the CEO and the management of the company understands the importance of employees and believes in employee’s participation in trouble shooting process. It was also possible since the employees themselves too were willing to accept such an organisational

The Lincoln Electric Company is the largest manufacturer of welding equipment in the world. John C. Lincoln founded the company in 1895 and incorporated it in 1906 where he moved it “from his one-room, fourth-floor factory to a new three-story building he erected in East Cleveland.” (Sharplin, 1989, A Historical Sketch pp. 1.). In 1907 John’s younger brother joined the company and in 1914 became the general manager and vice-president. It is here where the company began to define its culture with James instituting an employee elected advisory board who would be tasked with keeping James apprised on the operation of the company. This committee was also to be the voice of the employees to the executive team, a practice that is still performed today with twice-monthly meetings. The incentive programs set forth in these early years have laid the groundwork for sustaining high production levels while engaging employees in the feeling of pride and ownership of their and the company’s success. Many of the original incentive programs have changed little over the years and they continue to influence Lincoln Electric today.

The Lincoln Electric Company is one of the largest manufacturers of welding machines and electrodes in the world. With about 2,400 employees in the USA and near 600 workers in other countries. The Lincoln management plan is well known for accomplishing the highest worker productivity. His founder Mr. James F. Lincoln died in 1965, leaving a profitable and reliable company. As a president of the business, he invigorated a committee that was confirmed by representatives elected by employees. This committee called the Advisory Board met with him twice a month to advise him on the company operations. The Advisory Board was the pioneer of personal policies to provide benefits to their employees including the reduction of hours from 55 hours to 50 hours a week. In 1915 the workers received a paid-up life insurance. Two years after, the company opened a welding school that is still operating today. In 1919 The Lincoln Electric Employees’ Association was created to offer Health benefits and social activities to their employees.