Golden Rule Leaders and Organizations

To help people visualize what stakeholder leadership looks like, the Enterprise Engagement Alliance has begun an effort to highlight examples of leaders, companies, and other organizations whose actions embody or support is principles. These organizations, leaders, or academics, are chosen solely based on their demonstrated work or actions advocating for or demonstrating the value of harmonizing the interests of all shareholders and stakeholders toward a common purpose, goals, objectives, and values.

Click here to recommend an organization, organizational leader, or academic whose actions and commitment demonstrate the application of the Golden Rule to management.

ASML, Christophe Fouquet, CEO, ASML
Garry Ridge, CEO Emeritus, WD-40
Delta Airlines, Ed Bastion, CEO
CSX Railroad, Joe Hinrichs, CEO
R. Edward Freeman, Professor, Darden School at University of Virgina
JUST Capital, Chief Advocate for Stakeholder Capitalism 
Costco, Ron Vachris, CEO, Director

Christophe Fouquet, CEO, ASML

Given that ESM is an international publication, this week we select ASML for the Golden Rule designation. ASML is the Dutch maker of the world’s most sophisticated chip production machines— its extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography system is considered critical to making the advanced chips used in AI.
 
This company is the essence of the stakeholder capitalism model. Founded about 40 years ago to create chip manufacturing machines, ASML spent 17 years developing its most advanced EUV lithography technology, after earlier pioneering work with its PAS photo-electronic machine technology.
 
Today, the company employs about 23,000 people in the Netherlands, 8,300 in the US and globally about 44,000.
 
It’s CEO Christophe Fouquet gets a 91% approval rating on Glassdoor and 85% would recommend the company to a friend. Click here to check out the company’s US employee benefits and here to read its annual sustainability report.  (The benefits for Dutch employees are even more generous.)
 
ASML's leadership emphasizes a strategy that balances investor returns with value creation for customers, employees, distribution and supply chain partners and communities. It is known for a rigorous customer-centric approach with a focus on continuous improvement; strong industry partnerships; a long-term financial strategy to help ensure sustainable growth while returning cash to shareholders through dividends and share buybacks and clearly integrates ESG considerations into its business strategy.
 
The company says, “Our aim is to create long-term sustainable value for our stakeholders, while also contributing to the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)....Our ESG (environmental, social, governance) sustainability strategy extends from our production operations, logistics and business facilities, to our suppliers, and our products and services, including their downstream impact. We have identified the nine key themes across E, S and G where we can reduce the negative impact and amplify the positive.”
 
Shareholders have benefited. With a five-year gain of 145%, the company’s stock exceeded the S&P 500 of 123% over the same period, not including dividend payments.
 
The world would be a better place if every company were managed this way.

Garry Ridge, CEO, Emeritus of WD-40

Garry Ridge, now retired from his CEO position at WD-40, the commercial lubricant company, is the sixth leader selected by the Enterprise Engagement Alliance to illustrate the principles and leadership paradigm of stakeholder capitalism. Having just published his book, Any Dumbass Can Do it, a prescription for effective leadership, he’s an active speaker, executive coach, and podcast guest happy to share his vision.

Ridge is retired now after a stellar career at WD-40, with a return for shareholders that looks almost like a Nvidia over his tenure, due in part to a very successful international expansion. What he appears most proud of is his strategic focus on people, the importance of creating a powerful culture, what he has called a tribe. During the Great Recession, when almost everyone in manufacturing and related supplies laid off the majority of their workforces, Ridge found a way to keep them all employed. People made sacrifices, jobs were shared, but everyone remained employed. Guess what. When the economy returned, which industrial lubricant firm was able to spring most quickly back into action?

Click here with an article with more details on his career, as well as an interview with him on the EEA YouTube channel.

Ed Bastion, CEO of Delta Airlines

The world (and investors) would be better off if every company were run like Delta Airlines.

Here’s a quote from Ed Bastian’s bio on the Delta web site:

“When asked to sum up his job in five words, Ed’s response is: ‘Taking care of our people.’ The answer reflects his leadership philosophy, which is based on the ‘virtuous circle’ – if you take care of your people, they take care of your customers, whose business and loyalty allow you to reward your investors.”

This is the foundational principle of stakeholder capitalism.

The company has received almost every award possible for employee engagement and customer satisfaction.

Employees enjoy relatively good pay, benefits, profit sharing, and robust recognition for performance.  The company even provides incentives for employees to participate in a financial wellness program to help them better manage their money.

On Glassdoor, 85% of employees give Bastian high marks; the company gets a 4.2 employee rating. It rates among the highest of airlines in customer service by J.D. Powers and the American Customer Satisfaction Index.

Shareholders have done okay as well. Over the last five years, Delta’s stock has risen almost 100%, not quite even with the S&P 500 over that time, but much better than American Airlines, Southwest, or JetBlue.  (Only United bested Delta’s stock performance over that time—up 193%.) Click here for an interview with Bastian.

Joe Hinrichs, President and CEO of CSX

His actions and active social media presence demonstrate a sincere focus on creating sustainable returns for investors by harmonizing the interests of the company’s shareholders, customers, employees, supply chain and distribution partners, and communities.

Click here for the Linkedin post announcing this designation.

As of 2025, CSX has and is facing multiple challenges due to the Baltimore bridge disaster, hurricanes in the Southeast, tariff uncertainties and other economic factors totally out of its control.

Stakeholder capitalism principles cannot prevent the storms nor eliminate the pain and animosities caused by painful tradeoffs, but they can help organizations survive and come out of thriving.

Whatever the outcome, it will be an example of stakeholder capitalism principles in business.

Check out this feature article and YouTube interview with Hinrichs the EEA had with him last year.

R. Edward Freeman, Professor at the Darden School at the University of Virginia.

R. Edward Freeman is considered by many to be the “father” of stakeholder capitalism.

Very few people have ever heard of stakeholder capitalism and even fewer of  Freeman, but his 1984 work, Strategic Management, a Stakeholder Approach, is the foundation of a simple proposition: organizations that build the concept of the Golden Rule into their business plans have a greater chance of success than those that don’t. That means better lives for shareholders, employees, customers, distribution and supply chain partners, communities, and a healthier environment. Note that Freeman received his Ph.D. in Philosophy, not business.

Click here for a link to the Linkedin post announcing this designation.

Stakeholder capitalism isn’t a well-known movement, perhaps because most people haven't heard of it, don’t understand it, or feel powerless to do anything about capitalism.

They can’t fire the CEOs, whereas at least they can vote out the politicians.

So the revolution is being led by little-known people like Freeman, whose academic work reportedly inspired the founders of Costco, Whole Foods, and others to focus on creating value through people rather than extracting it from them in terms of low pay, poor working conditions, unkept promises to consumers, and pollution and infrastructure damage to communities. 

His framework was drawn upon by the Business Roundtable when in 2019 it updated its charter of the corporation to address the interests of all stakeholders. He says he was astonished when his practical approach to value creation got caught up in the anti-ESG and virtue-signaling debate.

His work has helped inspire professors evident in the work Strategic Management Society’s Stakeholder Strategy interest group, so that the principles he proposed are increasingly incorporated into business school education.

If some day it becomes the norm for CEOs to embrace an approach to capitalism focused only on creating value for customers, employees, on all stakeholders, we will have R. Edward Freeman in part to thank.

To better understand his views, click here for an EEA YouTube show interview with Freeman.

JUST Capital—Chief Advocate for Stakeholder Capitalism

Here’s simple explanation for the enormous economic inequality in the richest country in the world: the failure of business to follow the Golden Rule.

We honor JUST Capital because no organization I know of is doing more to promote a more sustainable approach to capitalism that creates wealth by growing, rather than dividing the pie in the words of Alex Edmans. Click here for the Linkedin post announcing this designation.

Imagine what the US would be like if every business owner treated employees, customers, distribution and supply chain partners, communities and the environment as they would wish to be treated.

Wouldn’t most CEOs wish to be paid at least living wages in a safe workplace if they were workers? Then why do so many fail to do so?

Don’t we all wish to buy high quality products and services sold and backed up by effective customer service? Then why do so many companies fail in this regard?

If CEOs were distribution or supply chain partners, wouldn’t they wish fair payment terms? Then why do so many make their partners wait 120 days to get paid?

Don’t CEOs wish to live in communities with clean air and water free of abandoned factories and buildings? Why do so many companies leave big messes behind.

JUST Capital is making a big investment to convince CEOs that stakeholder capitalism is just better business.

Click here for an interview with Martin Whittaker, CEO.

Ron Vachis, CEO, Costco

Contrary to the red-herrings thrown about by left- and right-wing opponents, Costcoproves that stakeholder capitalism is not about virtue signaling or making donations to worthy causes, it’s based on building value creation for all stakeholders into your business model.

The company exemplifies total quality management for people, not just processes.  Click here for a link to the Linkedin post announcing this designation.

A focus on value creation was the vision of founders James Sinegal and Jeffrey Brotman in 1983 and lives on today under the leadership of Ron Vachris, who started as a forklift operator.

Its stock is up 214% over the last five years (vs. 117% for the S&P 500) while paying its employees far above the going wages for pay and benefits while maintaining remarkable customer loyalty.  For years, the company's stock fell after the company announced pay increases. Click here to review the company's benefits programs.

It pays to do onto others what you would have done on to you.

For More Information

Bruce Bolger, Founder; Enterprise Engagement Alliance; 914-591-7600, ext. 230; [email protected]