Today’s Wall Street Journal ran a very interesting article entitled, “Workers of Europe Innovate” about a democratic company called FAVI operating in the north of France. The business is an old-economy as it comes; it’s 800 employees make copper forks for automatic gear boxes. It is the European leader in this niche, owning over 50 percent of the market. The secret to their success? According to CEO Jean-Francois Zobrist, they work to “free workers from the arbitrary restrictions of the chain of command, or rather, the chaine de comment – the chain of ‘how’.” What matters most at FAVI is “ why” and “for whom,” not “how.” FAVI has no personnel department, there is virtually no middle management, and the company is organized into teams that choose their leader. Mr. Zobrist believes that most businesses are “Soviet” in character, relying on central control by bosses. Fredrick Hayek, the Noble Prize winning economist argued some 60 years ago that decentralized systems would always beat out centralized systems because “all important information is distributed to the man-on-the-spot.” Looks like FAVI understands the power of this concept and knows how to successfully operate a decentralized and democratic company – even in France.