Horizontal vision

The management style at Sun Hydraulics is so efficient it doesn't even have managers.

It's one of several unique characteristics of the firm's horizontal, or flat, system of work. The foundation of the system, created by Sun co-founder Bob Koski in 1970, is hierarchy charts will cripple a company. It will delay decisions and force employees into defensive groupthink mentality.

Al Carlson, CEO of the screw-in cartridges and hydraulic valve manufacturer, with $204.3 million in annual sales, says he even prefers the term leadership over management. He says that more accurately describes how the 700-employee firm has prospered over four decades.