Ten years ago, South Mountain Company,
John Abrams's design-build firm on Martha's
Vineyard, didn't exactly need fixing. After a
few years of doing good, if sometimes unprofitable,
work (one friend of Abrams called the
money-losing jobs "subsidized housing for the
rich"), Abrams had learned how to run a viable
business. He liked his work, did it well, and he was
making money.
Nevertheless, Abrams at that point made a
change some would consider radical: He switched
from an S corporation wholly owned by himself to
an employee-ownership structure, in which longterm
employees could buy in and share the company's
management and profits. At first this meant
sharing ownership with two other people; then
three, then four.