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Monahan, 49, a veteran 3M group vice president, fairly leaped at the chance to create a new culture. "Any business leader has to get excited about the opportunity to build something totally different," he observes. First to go: private offices. Everyone works out of cubicles--Dilbert-like, it must be noted--which assures there is no place to hide. All this came as a shock to Steve Frederickson, a 23-year 3M veteran who manages Imation branding and packaging programs. Frederickson had to swap a 300-sq.-ft. 3M office with a window for a 64-sq.-ft. modular cell. Gone too is his stall in a heated underground parking garage--a coveted perk during deep-freeze Minnesota winters.
"The tendency was to bitch and complain," says Frederickson. "We all kind of commiserated for a while. But then we realized, 'Oh, I can talk to this person,' which starts you toward the openness that has developed." Still, Frederickson sighs, "I could use another foot of desk space."
The message of this open environment is that in a stripped-down company every job counts, and every job holder will be held accountable. Some workers revel in this action-oriented culture that encourages them to cross traditional lines. Melissa Kaar, a 22-year-old meeting and convention planner, bursts into the doorless bullpen that Monahan shares with his three top executives when she has ideas to pitch. "I never pictured myself, especially at this age, being able to do that," says Kaar. Comments Rick Anderson, a printing and publishing marketer whose work space is adjacent to his boss's: "When we want to get something done, we don't schedule a meeting. We just lean over and say, 'Let's get this done, right now.'"
The downside of so much spontaneity, not to mention the downsizing, has been a grinding work load. "I always perceived work to be a means to an end, but not the end," observes Doug Dix, 54, a customer-service consultant on leave from 3M who plans to retire next month. Elsewhere, benefits director Ron Dockery puts in 80-hour weeks and proudly displays a note from his 13-year-old daughter that reads, "Thanks for working so hard at work and still having time for me."
To reward this kind of work, Imation is creating profit-sharing incentives for all workers and launching programs designed to give employees ownership of more than 5% of the company's shares. Basic pay and benefits are the same as at 3M. "Start messing with someone's pay," Dockery says, "and their mind is going to be on that, not on the success of the business."
So far, Wall Street has been unimpressed. Imation stock, which traded at $23.87 when the company went on the New York Stock Exchange, closed last week at $22. The slow start reflected the company's $37.8 million loss for the second quarter, which included $43.5 million in restructuring charges. That's not unexpected. Shares of a spin-off often lag at first and then sprint ahead as the newly formed company, like a newborn gazelle, discovers its legs. Many spin-offs, freed of the corporate anchor, really do run free and thrive. The irony is that these companies then catch the eye of huge corporations on the prowl for acquisition. So if Imation does flourish, it could again wind up in the belly of a big corporate beast. Its workers should enjoy their freedom while they can.
--Reported by Marq Hequet/St. Paul