Transformative Stories of Employee Ownership and Success

Explore how private equity-backed companies are empowering employees through ownership programs, creating wealth, and fostering professional growth. Watch these inspiring stories of workers benefiting directly from their companies’ success.

KKR Pays Employees As Much As $325K

Pete Stavros, KKR global co-head of private equity, discusses the company’s push for more employee ownership.

KKR’s C.H.I. Overhead Doors: Culture of Ownership

60 Minutes featured C.H.I.’s employees becoming partial owners, with significant equity payouts averaging $175,000.

Riverside Portfolio Companies: Shared Ownership

Employees from PFB Corporation, siffron, and SCRAM Systems share their excitement about being part of a shared ownership program.

Giving Workers
a Stake in Success

Many private equity firms have partnered with Ownership Works, a nonprofit initiative that builds employee wealth by expanding shared employee ownership of companies, enabling employees to directly benefit from the company’s success. Since its founding in 2021, Ownership Works has impacted nearly 112,000 employees nationwide, generating over $130 million in payouts to low- and moderate-income workers.

The Riverside Company

Employees and leaders of Riverside’s portfolio companies, PFB Corporation, siffron, and SCRAM Systems, shared their excitement about being part of a shared ownership program that gives employees a direct stake in the success of the business.

KKR

60 Minutes featured a story about KKR portfolio company  C.H.I. Overhead Doors (C.H.I.) after it became part of an ownership program that made all 800 of C.H.I.’s employees partial owners of the company. Employees experienced a “culture of ownership” and received a payout on equity that averaged $175,000 on top of their regular salary, as well as approximately $9,000 in dividends since 2015.

Blackstone

Blackstone announced it would grant ownership stakes to most employees at its portfolio companies, which would apply to all new Blackstone investments going forward. This initiative will kick off by granting ownership to roughly 18,000 employees of Copeland, a manufacturer that builds commercial heating and cooling systems.

New Mountain Capital

New Mountain Capital created over $1.3 billion of value for employees at portfolio companies sold since 2018. CEO Steven B. Klinsky sees private equity as a socially positive pursuit.

Leonard Green & Partners

Over 7,500 portfolio-company employees participate in profit-sharing or similar distributions in 2021 alone, and over $1 billion was shared with workers outside the executive suite.

Key Statistics: Impact of
Private Equity on Employees

$130M

generated in payouts to low- and moderate-income workers by Ownership Works since 2021.

112,000

employees impacted by shared ownership programs through Ownership Works nationwide.

Opening Doors for Employees

Private equity investments strengthen portfolio company employees’ skills development and career outlooks. Operational improvements create professional development opportunities for workers that enhance future job prospects.

Blackstone’s Career Pathways program works with portfolio companies to “increase access” and “enable advancement” for diverse and historically underrepresented potential hires. The program has led 50 of Blackstone’s portfolio companies to welcome 6,000 talent hires who might have otherwise been untapped. Blackstone portfolio companies have also hired over 100,000 veterans, veteran spouses, and caregivers since 2013 through the Veterans Hiring Initiative.

Supporting a Healthy Work Environment

Workers employed by private equity-backed businesses can depend upon strong wages and safe work environments. In 2022, the average U.S. private equity sector worker, both full- and part-time, earned around $80,000 in wages and benefits—the equivalent of about $41 per hour for a full-time worker and higher than the national average.

On top of a positive company culture and employee compensation, private equity investments help facilitate safer workplaces for employees, which helps protect workers and improve operational efficiency across portfolio companies. In fact, researchers from the Bureau of Labor Statistics, University of Georgia, and University of Texas at Austin found that public companies bought by private equity experienced “a large, sustained decline” in workplace injury rates – indicating that private equity helps “improve workplace safety.”

Driving Economic Growth

Private equity employs 12 million workers, generating over $1 trillion of U.S. GDP in 2022. The sector is critical in supporting American workers’ livelihoods and contributing to a strong U.S. economy.

A recent report by Ernst & Young LLP (EY) and the American Investment Council (AIC) shows that private equity-backed small businesses, their suppliers, and related consumer spending supported 4.4 million workers earning $360 billion in wages and benefits and $615 billion of GDP in 2022, driving economic growth and fostering entrepreneurship.