Thomas Roback, Jr., CEP, QKA, is Chief Revenue Officer for Blue Ridge ESOP and VP, Membership for the Mid-Atlantic Carolinas ESOP Association. He attended the Mid-Year Fellows Workshop in Honor of Louis O. Kelso this year. Here, he talks about what topics were covered, why attending is important, and how he’ll use what he learned going forward.
After an exhilarating few days on the Hill with The ESOP Association (TEA) staff and chapter volunteers from across the country, I drove up to Rutgers to share time with academics around the world who are interested in employee-ownership. The Mid-Year Fellows Workshop was organized by the Institute for the Study of Employee Ownership and Profit Sharing of the Rutgers University School of Management and Labor Relations and it’s named Louis Kelso, who was a political economist, corporate and financial lawyer, author, and merchant banker. He is widely credited as an ESOP pioneer.
The purpose of the annual workshop is to study different forms of capital ownership, which includes ESOPs. The event draws ownership experts from across the globe, including several TEA professionals. Jim Bonham, TEA President and CEO and EOF President, delivered the Plenary Address and he always offers an interesting speech. This year was no different, with remarks that prompted an engaging discussion on ESOPs versus other forms of employee-ownership. Greg Facchiano, VP of TEA Government Relations and Public Affairs; and Kristie Mark, TEA COO, were there mingling with academics too.
I really enjoyed catching up with Steve Storkan, Executive Director for the Employee Ownership Expansion Network (EOX), who was honored as a 2026 Rutgers Executive Fellow. He and Aaron Dean, CEO of Deanalytics, recently completed a study that shows the real-life benefits that ESOPs have delivered. According to EOX, the two “compiled and analyzed data on aggregate ESOP distributions from 2009 to 2024, including the impact of terminated ESOPs on those payouts. The goal of the data study was to put clearer numbers behind the enormous economic impact of what ESOPs have delivered for workers over an extended period.” Stay tuned for more information and insights about this data.
Another highlight was running into Ian MacFarlane, CEO of EA Engineering, Science, and Technology, Inc. EA is people-cultured and mission-focused and by all accounts they’re a success story of how culture can thrive once an ESOP is established. Now a global company, EA went public in 1986, private in 2001, did a partial ESOP in 2005, and became 100-percent employe-owned in 2014. EA has a bottom-up sustainability history inspired by their millennial employees. Turnover is low compared to industry peers. They actually doubled the Gallup employee engagement score after the ESOP was implemented. EA regularly gets high scores from federal clients, and their win rate improved by more than 20 percent after their ESOP was implemented. Their treasurer, Peter Ney, probably has the most technical ESOP knowledge of any plan sponsor in the ESOP world. Ian and Peter are great examples of what servant leadership means.
Big congratulations to Ken Baker, CEO of NewAge Industries, for receiving the Rutgers Institute Award for his continued support and leadership in the ESOP community. His generosity and ESOP energy have grown employee-ownership in Pennsylvania and beyond.
This workshop is always time well spent and I look forward to attending again next year.
