Co-Founder
Project Equity
Hilary Abell co-founded Project Equity and has a long history with worker cooperatives, first as a worker-owner at Equal Exchange and, since 2003, as a cooperative developer specializing in companies that create quality jobs in low- and middle-wage sectors. She has worked with dozens of co-ops in her years at WAGES (now Prospera) and Project Equity. As part of Project Equity’s client services team, Hilary supports businesses in exploring, envisioning and implementing transitions to broad-based worker ownership through co-ops, democratic ESOPs and perpetual trusts. She was a fellow with Echoing Green and BALLE and is passionate about facilitating change at every level: systems, organizations and individuals. Hilary has authored numerous publications including Worker Cooperatives: Pathways to Scale, Participatory Management: An Overview and Case Study of High-Involvement Cultures at Work, The Cooperative Growth Ecosystem: Inclusive Economic Development in Action (with Melissa Hoover), and a forthcoming paper on the demonstrated impact of employee ownership.